


Moonshot

by la lune (sage_advice)



Category: Twilight (Movies), Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Canon Rewrite, F/M, Fix-It, Twilight Renaissance, no the vampires do not sparkle, twilight - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-20
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:01:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 48,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26015419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sage_advice/pseuds/la%20lune
Summary: In a world where creatures such as vampires and werewolves inhabit all the dark and secluded corners of every continent, one young woman named Bella will find herself strangely drawn to a handsome and strange boy at her new school named Edward, who seems drawn to her as well. As their relationship blossoms, Bella learns secrets that put her and her family in danger and finds herself facing a future that she never envisioned for herself: immortal vampire. Will she fight for the love she shares with Edward, or will she attempt to flee the dark world that now ensnares her?
Relationships: Alice Cullen/Jasper Hale, Carlisle Cullen/Esme Cullen, Edward Cullen/Bella Swan, Emmett Cullen/Rosalie Hale
Comments: 10
Kudos: 36





	1. Foreword

# Foreword

This is a work of Twilight fanfiction that I certainly never believed I would be writing. 

I love Twilight, but like all those who truly love this series (and have since they were 12), I take issue with...a few things. My friends and I have complained for _years_ (because we love to complain about things we mutually love/hate, as friends do) about the things in Twilight that should definitely have been given more thought before the final manuscript was sent to the printing house. 

Finally, this year (#2020pandemic), I broke down and said to myself, “babe, if you’re gonna complain about it every time you talk about it, why don’t you just try to write what you’d _rather_ read?”

That’s really all this work is to me—something I wanted to try and found out I enjoyed more than I thought I would. I took what bothered me about the Twilight universe and changed just those things (along with some plot points) while keeping the bits I loved most. 

Here’s a rough list of alterations: 

  * Vampires do not sparkle—there’s another, better reason they avoid direct sunlight (no spoilers). 
  * Vampires can sleep if they want to—they aren’t ants, they’re just immortal, they should be allowed to sleep, but I didn’t make it a requirement in the same manner that it is for humans. 
  * Werewolves can’t imprint on infants—what the heck? That’d be creepy and weird; instead, imprinting is much more closely tied to attraction and mirrors the mating system in the Vampire world, where two parties have to agree. This has the added benefit of allowing Jacob to hope that one day, he will imprint on Bella, even though it didn’t happen to him immediately. 
  * Along a similar path—you will find no Jacob x Renesmee here. No judgement from me, there are plenty of other fics you can read if you want to ship them, but this isn’t going there so don’t get your hopes up. (Jacob still finds love though, don’t worry.) 
  * Bella isn’t clumsy—this always made no sense to me. When she was turned in the books, suddenly she was as graceful as Alice, but literally no other vampire experienced anything like that. Rosalie was beautiful—she became an unearthly beautiful vampire. Alice was a human psychic—she gained the ability to see the future as a vampire. Esme was maternal—as a vampire, she’s extra motherly. So Bella has normal human balance. End rant. 
  * The Cullens aren’t weirdly obsessed with high school—there’s a reason they had to come to Forks and a moderately less lame reason they posed as teenagers (but with this point of contention, there was really only so much I could do). 
  * Rapid fire round: Mike sucks more, Jess sucks less, Edward doesn’t drive a Volvo (just a personal preference), Rosalie doesn’t hate Bella “because Edward thinks she’s prettier” (are you kidding me with that?), Charlie isn’t so helpless that he needs Bella to take care of him (she left Renee in the hands of Phil _for a reason_ ), Edward isn’t afraid to get his clothes dirty, Jacob understands consent, and Bella doesn’t have crippling self-esteem issues that prevent her from accepting love and affection (instead, she has personal goals and aspirations that she isn’t willing to just drop because Edward shows up and smells nice) 



Obviously, I’m not a professional writer and I do not have anyone editing for me so if there are some typos and minor discrepancies, please, be kind. I also want those things to be fixed, and will attempt to do so as they come to my attention. 

Lastly, I just want to say that this fanfic is a labor of love and not something for which I receive payment. I also work a full-time job, so this is really more of a hobby and a creative outlet for me. I’m just a twenty-something woman trying my best to make a beloved, but problematic, work of fiction a little less problematic without changing absolutely everything about it. Therefore, if I seriously offend any minority or demographic in any way (by mistakenly writing something ableist or sexist or racist, for instance), _please_ tell me so I can address that and make reparations. I promise you, any such interpretation of my work will not be intentional on my part. 

Having said all this, I hope that anyone who comes across this work will give it a chance and derive some enjoyment from it. 

Thanks for reading, 

LA LUNE


	2. Chapter One - Forks

Green-tinted light from a hazy midday sun filtered through thin curtains into the bedroom I hadn’t seen since I was fourteen years old. The furniture was sitting exactly where it always had. This included a dusty bookshelf and a wooden rocking chair that hadn’t been needed since this was my nursery. Small attempts to modernize it had been made, to little effect. The bed now sported a new comforter and pillows, but that was the only notable change.

I set down the suitcase I’d been carrying and sighed, taking it all in. Time had not moved in this space. It wasn’t so much that I minded as it was that I had hoped maybe Charlie would have turned this room into an office by now, or maybe even a home gym. Instead, it was a shrine...to me. 

The entire house was a shrine, really. He and my mother had bought it back when they married and, after the divorce, my dad had simply kept living here. As far as I knew, he hadn’t really been in a relationship since my mother left. Maybe this shrine was part of the problem.

Charlie stepped up beside me with my other suitcase in hand. Like this room, he hadn’t changed much over the years. His hair was greying around the edges and he sported fine lines around his eyes from squinting too much, but he still had deep brown eyes—the same color as mine—and a commanding presence no matter where he was. He cleared his throat. 

“I hope you like purple,” he said. He tended to avoid eye contact when he spoke to me, as if fearing he’d find a look of regret in my eyes. “I had the lady at the store help pick something out. The old one was pink, which your mom said you hated. Feel free to redecorate…”

I smiled reassuringly at him. “Purple is cool. I appreciate you worrying about it, Dad.” 

He grunted, which I was learning to interpret as a positive, if noncommittal, response to most of my assurances.  _ Everything is fine. I want to be here. Don’t worry, Charlie.  _

Not everything I said was exactly true, but I wanted it to be true and would make it so. Soon. I had promised myself that it could be done, and no matter what struggles arose I could always remind myself of one certainty: this was better for everyone, including me. 

My mom needed to have her own space with Phil.

Phil had been wonderful for my mother. He was as young as she felt—and acted—but he grounded her without even trying and accepted all her quirks and eccentricities as just more parts of the person he loved. I liked Phil. 

But living with the two of them was akin to living with a newlywed couple, despite how long they’d been together. It was hard for them to remember I was there, and no matter how many times they promised it would never happen again, they couldn’t seem to help themselves. 

When Phil had been given the orders to transfer to Jacksonville, I had seen my saving grace at last: Charlie. It was a crazy decision, but I had felt strangely giddy at the thought of it. With my mother being so caught up in the thrill of following Phil to the far eastern coastline, she wouldn’t even have time to be too upset that I was quietly bowing out to get away from her. Of course I would miss her terribly, but I was nearly a senior now—a year and a half was all I would have to endure before I could escape to college somewhere else. 

The only problem was that Charlie and I had not really kept in touch. To say he had been shocked when I called him and told him I wanted to live with him would’ve been an understatement. As I had grown up, my visits had become less and less frequent until they stopped altogether. They whittled down to phone calls and Christmas cards, but those things didn’t help me now that I was here. 

Forks was so much smaller than my child mind had thought it was. Even in my teenage mind, I hadn’t properly conceptualized the inherent problems with living at the very edge of the world. I had fooled myself into believing it was close to Seattle and close to Vancouver and other, much more populated locations. 

Wrong. Forks was close to nothing, except for Olympic National Park and the Quileute Reservation. No drive in or out of the area was easy, which meant that if one wanted to leave for a while they needed to be damn sure about their decision. My mother never talked about her choice to leave when I was a toddler, but I now wondered if she would have left much sooner had that decision not involved several hours of driving on slick, winding mountain roads in semi-darkness with no cell service. 

It didn’t matter now. Charlie had picked me up from the airport and the journey was done. I was trapped by my own choice and I was determined to make the most of it. 

With a deep breath, I took my other suitcase from Charlie and set it on my bed. “Thanks for helping me. What time is dinner?”

He tugged on his belt out of habit, despite the fact that he wasn’t in uniform. “We’ll eat whenever you get settled in. Take however long you need.”

I nodded. “Alright. Thanks again...Dad.” It was a struggle not to call him Charlie out loud, but I knew he hated it, just as I preferred Bella to my full name, Isabella. We had an agreement, he and I.

He took my thanks as a cue to leave, and made a hasty check of my expression before ducking out. 

I made sure the only thing he saw was a smile. It would take time for him to get used to me wanting to be here.

Alone at last, I started exploring. The drawers in the dresser were empty, waiting for my clothes. The closet possessed a single storage box full of toys I didn’t remember playing with and some extra blankets. On the small wooden desk rested a computer so old I questioned the efficacy of turning it on. The bookshelf housed several volumes on fish and fishing along with a few beat-up classics, but there was plenty of room for the books and CDs I’d brought with me.

It took almost no time at all for me to move my things from the suitcases to their new homes and store the gutted containers beneath the bed. I was halfway through rearranging the books and CDs on the bookshelf into a more preferable order when I heard a new sound coming from outside. 

As I walked out the open front door, I caught sight of a massive—and ancient—red pickup truck and two strangers coming up the front walk, one pushing the other in a wheelchair. They both had dark brown skin and long, jet black hair and were smiling as they talked with Charlie. 

The one pushing the wheelchair noticed me first. He was younger than me by maybe a year and had wide, dark eyes that grew impossibly wider as he seemed to recognize me. His attention drew the other two sets of eyes my way. 

“Bella!” Charlie said, still smiling. “Come greet Billy and Jacob Black.” He gestured to each as he said their names. “Do you remember them?”

I smiled politely and stepped toward them, trying to tuck my hair behind my ears. After a long day of travel, my curls did not cooperate. “Not well, I’m sorry.”

Billy, the one in the wheelchair, chuckled. His eyes were not as pronouncedly large, but they seemed to shimmer shrewdly as he observed me. I felt slightly uncomfortable, being acutely stared at by both him and his son, as if they were waiting for me to say some magic word or turn into a pumpkin. 

“Hm,” he said. “You might remember my daughters better, but they’ve both moved away now.” He gestured behind him. “This is my son, Jacob. You all used to play together when you’d come to visit.” 

A hazy memory of running around in the grass with some other black-haired children surfaced from the recesses of my memory, and I nodded. “Ah, Rachael and Rebecca. How are they?”

“Enjoying college a little too much for my taste,” Billy chuckled fondly. He then turned back to Charlie. “Tell her why we’ve come so I can go inside before the game ends.” 

“Oh, right!” Charlie hastily beckoned me around Billy and Jacob, toward the driveway and the red truck. I did as he instructed, wondering what secrets the vehicle possessed. 

He cleared his throat when I stopped in front of him, turning slightly pink from embarrassment, and gestured awkwardly toward the vehicle. “This is...yours!” 

I blinked in surprise, and then gasped and gaped at him. “You bought me a truck?”

“If you can call it that.” I heard Jacob retort behind me. 

I whirled on him, pointing accusingly with my finger. “Don’t knock my truck.”

He blushed and finally looked away. Billy started laughing heartily at his expense. 

I returned my attention to the red truck and Charlie, walking around to examine it from all angles. 

Calling it red was actually a stretch. The paint was beyond faded and had lost its shine ages ago. The style of the cab was strange, and I wondered if some of the pieces had been collected from different models so that it was now Frankenstein’s truck. My grin only grew wider with this revelation. This truck was a monster that could easily eat other cars and likely any tree or deer that dared to stand in its way. It was perfect for me. 

I beamed at Charlie, overcome with elation, and ran to hug him, which was something I hadn’t even done upon spotting him in the airport. He reacted a bit belatedly, but it was alright. Somehow, unwittingly, he had banished one of my greatest fears about being here. I was significantly less trapped than I had been moments ago. 

I thanked Billy profusely, but he redirected all my gratitude toward Jacob, or Doctor Frankenstein himself. Apparently, Jacob was a savant mechanic who could revive even the most dilapidated of motor vehicles. It was impressive, especially at his age. 

“Don’t thank me till you drive it,” he said sheepishly when I turned to him. “Just make sure you don’t go to anyone else for maintenance. They’ll try to convince you to put her down.”

“Deal,” I promised easily. No one would be putting down my truck. 

Billy and Charlie moved the party inside to watch whatever sport was currently being played on television while Jacob showed me how to work the truck, which, due to its unusual makeup, had a few quirks. He was amused that I had likened it to Franenstein’s monster but begrudgingly admitted I had a point. 

“We don’t have a ton to work with on the Rez,” he said. “I got ahold of this baby a couple of years ago, but then I found some new stuff so she hasn’t been properly driven in a while.”

“What was she originally?” I asked. 

“A Chevy Task Force, I think.” 

I grinned.  _ Task Force _ sounded impressive, even if it wasn’t. 

“Well she’s perfect,” I reassured him, not that he needed much reassurance. He was proud of his accomplishment. I could tell he had been afraid I wouldn’t see it’s value, but now that I had there was nothing to worry about. 

We delayed going into the house and I learned that Jacob was surprisingly easy to talk to. He told me all about life on the Reservation and I told him all about Phoenix. Neither of us were particularly satisfied with our current situations, but we both had fathers we couldn’t dare admit that to. I found myself bummed that he didn’t go to Forks High School, where I’d be going starting tomorrow. It would have been nice to not be so alone. 

We kept talking and wouldn’t have stopped except our fathers called outside to tell us dinner was ready. It was just pan fried fish Billy had brought, but it was delicious and I found I was grateful that my first meal here with Charlie wasn’t a quiet, awkward affair. 

It was a few minutes after dark when Charlie drove them back home—Jacob didn’t technically have a license. Once he left, I cleaned the kitchen, learning where things were kept so I could find them later. It didn’t take very long. 

Charlie’s house was small, but I didn’t feel cramped. I had my own space and plenty of time to myself, since his job as the Chief of Police had him working long hours. Plus, with my truck, I could leave anytime I wanted. 

Just having the option to leave made staying here easier. 

In the small bathroom I shared with Charlie, I tried to force my reflection to smile and look pleased, or even just...content. It was a battle I was struggling to win. I didn’t want to lie. This place was mostly what I had expected it to be: calm, quiet, steady. I had been certain I would be fine with calm and quiet and steady for a year and a half, but had that assumption been a mistake? 

Maybe this place would prove me wrong. It was only day one, and I was getting ahead of myself. 

Before going to sleep, I called my mom to assure her I was happy and told her all about the truck. Packing up our house in Phoenix was apparently a chaotic affair without me. She cried for quite a few minutes as she told me she missed me, which had me fighting tears myself, but was back to joking around with me before I ended the call. 

I knew we would both be alright after that. 


	3. Chapter Two - First Encounters

The rain-slick roads to school the next morning were more difficult for me, who was used to dry flat desert streets, than I had anticipated. It did not help that the Frankentruck was larger than any vehicle I’d driven since attaining my license. I learned quickly that I had to throw all my weight into the brake pedal or I’d be stuck in the middle of every intersection. As a bonus, the engine was so old and loud that it vibrated right through the steering wheel and into my bones. 

But I was determined to make it work, so I arrived at the school parking lot in one piece, thankfully without causing any accidents along the way. Surely driving around would get easier with practice. 

Whatever. It wasn’t worth worrying over. 

Most of the cars in the parking lot were average and old like mine (though none boasted quite so unusual a form). Several were off-road capable and sported layers of mud and grime. It seemed that everyone here took advantage of the trails. I suspected the climate was most at fault for all the dull paint. 

As I walked across the lot, following the crowd of students while trying to decide which building was most likely to be the front office, something unusually shiny caught my attention out of the corner of my eye and I turned toward it almost without realizing what I was doing.

The SUV that was just now entering the lot was not like the others. In Phoenix, I wouldn’t have thought a thing of it, but here the sleek black paint had somehow retained its luster in the face of great adversity. My heart almost went out to it. Even with my limited awareness of car manufacturers I could tell by the shape it was luxury. It was also being driven entirely too fast. 

Who would possibly be capable of such a feat in Forks? 

Blessedly, the warning bell slapped me out of my trance before I could start my life at this school as the Weird Girl Who Stares At Cars and I hurried on up the wet concrete steps to the office. 

* * *

“Hi, I’m Jessica,” the girl said. She was standing practically between me and my open locker, holding out her hand for a handshake, smiling and not blinking as she did so. I shook her hand just to make her stop. 

“You’re Isabella Swan, right?” Her voice was as perky as her ponytail, and she was significantly shorter than me. 

“Just call me Bella,” I replied, trying to remember which books were important before I sealed them away behind a combination lock I hadn’t quite memorized.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” She gasped a bit loudly. I glanced at her, unnerved. I didn’t want to judge anyone before getting to know them, but I got the impression she had some ulterior motive in coming to talk to me. She went on with no prompting. “Anyway, since you probably don’t know anyone here—you don’t, right?—I thought I’d offer to show you around. And invite you to sit with me and my friends at lunch!” The last sentence was said with a bit too much insistence to come off casual. 

Satisfied that I wouldn’t fail any of my classes because of forgotten textbooks, I snapped my locker shut and faced Jessica head on. Her smile was too wide to be genuine, but she did not appear to be playing games with me out of malice. Despite not completely trusting her motives, I had no reason to turn her offer down. I didn’t particularly want to sit alone at lunch, and I was rather lost. 

“Alright, thanks,” I said. As I spoke, I became aware that I was being watched by several people standing behind Jessica further down the hall—two girls and three guys. They appeared to be monitoring our conversation and awaiting the outcome. 

Suddenly, I was much less sure about this course of action. 

But Jessica did help me find my first class, which we shared, and then my next which I shared with one of her friends, a guy named Eric who did not hide his eagerness to talk to me. After that, I met Angela, a pretty, dark-haired girl with glasses, for our English class. She was fairly shy, but opened up once I started asking her what books she liked and where she wanted to go to college. Jessica found me again after English because we had another class together. In this manner, I was passed along from person to person in their friend group so that I was never lost and had someone to talk to in every class. I supposed one of the perks of a small school was that there weren’t many classes to choose from so everyone was always together.

I soon got tired of correcting people about my name, though. Apparently, everyone had heard me referred to as “Isabella” for a while and it was sticking. Probably Charlie’s doing. 

Despite how friendly everyone was, I still felt like a goldfish in a glass bowl. Jessica’s friends were nice, but everywhere I went I could feel others listening in on my conversations with them. It was very unnerving and a little rude. 

This was not something I had really anticipated about going to a new school in a small, secluded town like Forks. To them, evidently, I was an alien—every detail I shared, no matter how trivial or mundane, was received with awe and prompted further questions. 

I actually missed my anonymity. 

By lunch, I was exhausted. I had been putting on a show all morning, yet felt fairly certain the show wasn’t over. 

Jessica was finally able to command my attention again, but her efforts to monopolize me were thwarted often by Mike, who I quickly realized was just Male Jessica. Like her, he was abnormally perky, and his floppy blonde hair gave me the impression that he had been a golden retriever in a past life. Also like her, his motives were questionable. I disliked the way he leaned too close to me and changed his opinions on things when I voiced interest or disinterest in them. Eric and the other boy, Tyler, weren’t much better, just less boisterous. 

I made the mistake of looking to the other girls for help. Jessica was smiling too widely again, staring at Mike with fire in her eyes which I soon identified as jealousy. Angela was engrossed in something she was reading on her phone, not paying any attention or really even participating in conversation. The third girl, Lauren, was merely seething in my general direction, though I hadn’t really talked to her and wasn’t sure why. 

The boys paid the girls almost no attention whatsoever while peppering me with inane questions. 

Finally, I grew so annoyed that I stood abruptly from the table with the excuse of needing to use the restroom just to get away. 

Every single one of them offered to show me the way. I managed to avoid rolling my eyes as I refused their assistance, stalking off quickly. Surely these people wouldn’t treat me like a shiny toy forever. 

Outside the cafeteria, I saw that it had started to rain. 

Great. 

There was no reason for me to be surprised about sudden rain in Forks, but the change in weather was just going to make this day that much more frustrating. 

I leaned against a wall and closed my eyes, breathing and trying to rally enough nerve to face the rest of the day. 

_This is just the first of many_ , I reminded myself. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad one, but I supposed that was up to how I approached it. 

When I felt at least marginally less frustrated, I turned and went back inside the cafeteria. 

The moment I stepped inside, however, the sensation of being watched struck me anew. My eyes went to Jessica’s table, but to my surprise none of her group had even noticed my return. 

Hesitantly, I scanned the rest of the room. It was harder to stand out in a big crowded room than in a tiny classroom, and just as I had hoped, none of the people at the other tables seemed to even care that I existed. 

Except one. My eyes froze in the middle of scanning, arrested suddenly by a pair of dark black eyes set into the most devastatingly handsome face I had ever seen.

His table was in the far corner of the room, but even at this distance I was struck by his strange, almost ethereal presence. His hair was a dark honey copper color and fell with perfect grace into his eyes. He had a straight nose and a strong jaw, but there was something incredibly soft about his face that seemed almost...lovely. 

The fact that he was staring at me was not what stopped me in my tracks. I’d been stared at all day. Nor was it the fact that he was definitely the most attractive boy I’d ever laid eyes on. No. Despite his beauty, he was definitely strange. Just as I had earlier suspected Jessica of using me for attention, I now sensed that this boy was made angry by my very existence. 

His gaze was almost wild and his handsome features were twisted into an expression of acute frustration. 

This made no sense to me. I had never seen this boy before in my life, nor had I interacted with him. Absolutely nothing I’d done today could warrant this level of animosity. 

My instincts all tripped over one another. Some told me to run for cover while others told me to march over to this boy’s table and demand to know what his problem was. War was waged, but the outcome was inconsequential. None of my instincts could compete with my desire to stare at this boy’s angelic face as long as possible.

“There you are!” 

Someone grabbed my elbow and yanked me forward harshly. My head snapped away from the boy and toward the person grabbing me automatically. 

It was Jessica. I expected her to look angry or jealous still, but instead she was smug. “You got caught staring at the Cullens, didn’t you?”

I blinked at her uncomprehendingly. “What?”

“The Cullens,” she repeated, gesturing with her head toward the far corner of the cafeteria. “I know they’re beautiful and it’s kind of hard to look away, but they seriously hate it when people stare and can be pretty scary when they want to be. I strongly advise against it.” 

Oh. Is that what had just happened? I reexamined the last minute, trying to remember if I had started staring at the boy before he started staring at me, but felt certain he had been watching me first. I shook my head, forcing my eyes to focus on Jessica and not wander over there again. The desire to do so was almost too strong. 

“Who...are they?” I asked her hesitantly. 

She tugged me back toward her table before answering me. “They’re Dr. and Mrs. Cullen’s foster kids. Three of them are seniors and two are juniors. They all stick together and don’t really associate with the rest of us even though they moved here two years ago.” That fact clearly annoyed her. “Don’t bother trying to get their attention. The only one not taken is the one who caught you staring, and he refuses to date anyone. Probably thinks he’s too good for the rest of us.” 

I appreciated her explanation, despite the fact that this intel was highly biased and laced with bitterness. More than likely, she’d gotten turned down by one of the Cullen boys in the past and had not yet gotten over it. I had to cover up a chuckle with a fake cough as I sat back down at the table—this time safely wedged between Jessica and Angela. 

The boys went right back to whatever they had been talking about before, thankfully, and Jessica and Lauren joined in their conversation, leaving me to ponder the strange boy while sitting in silence with Angela, who was still engrossed in something else. 

Despite knowing I shouldn’t and telling myself I wouldn’t, I stole several more glances at the mysterious Cullens. Each time I did, I found no one staring back, but that hardly mattered as I was starting to notice that the strangeness of the first boy could be found in the other four as well. 

Foster siblings? Was Jessica certain they weren’t blood related? They were all beautiful—heartbreakingly so, despite being rather pale—yet, as I studied them further, I saw that it was impossible. They shared very few physical traits in common. Perhaps one or two of them might share a relative, but what bound them together as strikingly similar was their otherness. They did not belong—not in forks, not in reality. Maybe in a movie or on television, surrounded by other strange and beautiful things, but even that was a bit of a stretch. 

The one who had caught me in his gaze sat beside another boy, but the beauty of the second did not stop me up short—no, it was his size. I suspected he was older than the others, possibly held back a few grades. That was more likely the reason he looked as though he had left the NFL to take AP Literature. His arms and shoulders were thickly corded with muscle, straining even beneath his rain jacket. His dark hair and square jaw added to both his handsomeness and his formidability. 

Beside him was a tall girl who I could only assume had once been a silver screen actress. If the first boy’s hair was laced with strands of copper, hers was laced with strands of pure gold. It was very long and fell in a waterfall over one shoulder, perfectly curled. She had a heart-shaped face and long dark lashes, which she fluttered prettily every few moments at the NFL player beside her. He seemed to find her flirtations amusing. I could tell they were talking privately. 

Next to her on the other side was the last boy in the group. Though he was also attractive, I was not as inclined to stare at him. His hair was also blonde, though darker than the actress’s and longer than the other two boys. Despite his relaxed posture and neutral expression, he seemed uncomfortable. His eyes would dart away every so often in a manner that made me wary. What did he see that I didn’t? 

The last Cullen was the smallest. She was waif thin with dark hair in a pixie cut and though I couldn’t place her as the most beautiful when sitting beside the golden-haired girl, I found myself wanting to watch her more. Her eyes were unfocused, staring off into thought rather than at anything in particular, but whatever she was thinking about, her expression kept shifting in response. Unlike the others, she was in constant motion, tapping fingers and toes and making faces at things I couldn’t see. Every few minutes, she would turn to look at the boy beside her, and he would relax by degrees. The way they looked at each other made my stomach flip. Their relationship seemed closer than that of adopted siblings, but I didn’t want to assume anything. 

The bell rang, startling me and signaling the end of lunch. Hastily, I stole one last glance at the Cullens and caught just the barest hint of an amused smile on the face of the copper-haired boy. 

Why did I feel that he was laughing at me? 

But I quickly lost any ability to watch the Cullens as the crowd of other students bottlenecked to the exit. 

As I stood to dump my tray of food, Mike fell into step beside me and offered to walk me to my next location. I tried to decline, but, much to my dismay, we were headed to the exact same Biology class. 

The rain hadn’t let up a bit since I saw it out the window, so the walk to class resulted in the both of us getting soaked. Mike took advantage of the fact that my jacket didn’t have a hood and hovered closely over me with the excuse of shielding me from the torrent. 

It took far too much willpower to refrain from shoving him away. I definitely needed to buy a better raincoat. 

As soon as we were through the door, though, I sighed with relief. This room had assigned seating—lab partners, two to a table. Mike’s partner grinned and beckoned him over. He would not be able to sit beside me. 

I hung my raincoat with the other students’ and went to talk to the teacher while the rest of the class filed in. The teacher welcomed me warmly and then gestured behind me toward the back of the classroom and the only empty seat available. 

Thanking him, I turned, but then immediately froze. 

Sitting at the same table as my empty seat was the beautiful Cullen boy I’d made eye contact with during lunch. All amusement appeared to have left his expression now. His dark eyes were narrowed in my direction and something akin to displeasure seemed to roll off him.

Anger rose inside me. This was different from before. The situation had changed. I didn’t care how attractive he was—I would not let him treat me like a leper. I shook off my apprehension and stomped toward him, ignoring Mike’s bid for my attention as I passed by. 

The closer I got to the Cullen boy, the more he seemed to freeze up. Those black eyes were maddeningly impossible to read. He seemed to me like a cornered animal, full of dread and close to lashing out. It was clear that the last thing he wanted to do was sit beside me. 

Well, that was just fine. I dropped into my chair, dumped my books on the table in front of me, and turned my face away from him completely, keeping the curtain of my hair firmly between his face and mine. 

Or rather, I tried to. It was an impossible task for my curious nature. The teacher had launched into a lesson I already understood, so it was not interesting enough to divert my attention from the strangely beautiful boy cringing away from me nearby. More than once during that hour I tried to look at him through my hair, but I had foiled my own plot—my curls were too thick, like a wall of ivy. He couldn’t see me and I couldn’t see him. 

Curiosity warred with stubbornness, but I could focus on nothing else and wouldn’t be satisfied until I had looked at him with my own two eyes. So I peeked.

Shock and, suddenly, fear shot through me. He was sitting as far from me as possible while still remaining at the table and his eyes—those impossibly black eyes—were glaring a hole into my face. He held himself stiffly frozen, as if he’d become a statue. I wondered if he was holding his breath. 

I let my hair fall back between us and clenched my hands. Part of me wanted to write this boy off as merely weird and not worry about it anymore, but his problem was clearly with me. Did I smell? Had I said something earlier in the day to inadvertently offend him without knowing it? 

Question after question clanged around in my brain, but I grew no closer to answering any of them before the bell rang, signaling the end of class. 

So quickly—too quickly—I heard his chair scrape against the floor and before I could even react he was out the door and out of sight, little more than a breeze blowing past me. 

I sat there for several heartbeats, staring down at his seat and running my hands through my hair in frustration as I tried to puzzle it out. Nothing was making any sense. 

What was wrong with him, and how was I involved? I had done nothing—nothing!—all day and yet he seemed to hate my guts. Was this normal behavior and I was just not getting it? I had to ask Jessica more questions. 

I found myself grateful to Mike after all. He walked me to my next class despite the fact that I paid him no attention, which was the only reason I arrived at the right building instead of wandering off into the woods, lost in thought. 

The rest of the day was a wash. I didn’t feel too guilty about not paying attention, but this could not go on. If I was going to sit next to this boy every day in Biology while he simmered and seethed beside me, I would never be able to focus. Either I figured this out quickly or I found a way to avoid the Cullen boy like the plague. 

After the final bell rang, I had to go to the front office again to return my approved schedule. My mind was still impossibly distracted, but as I stepped through the doorway, all of my focus shifted forward without my permission. 

The Cullen boy was here. Not only that, but he was acting differently—again. Did he have Multiple Personality Disorder? My anger resurfaced, but he hadn’t noticed my entry. 

Now that I saw him standing so close, not hunched and glaring like a gargoyle, I realized—regretfully—that he was even more attractive when he was trying. Surely there was something wrong with me that I couldn’t stop being sidetracked by this, right? Was it just that he was tall? Was it something to do with his confidence? 

His back was to me as he spoke to the secretary in a soft, almost melodic voice. 

This was, strangely, the first I had heard him speak. Even though he had glared at me harshly enough in Biology that I got the message, no words had ever actually been exchanged. I didn’t feel the slightest bit of remorse eavesdropping on his conversation as I waited my turn. 

“I’m sorry, dear, truly, but there are simply no other science classes that fit in with your schedule,” the secretary explained. 

He was trying to get out of Biology. I laughed inwardly. Of course he was, the coward. 

“Perhaps there is something else I can take besides a science course, then,” he suggested. I hated how nice his voice sounded when he was trying to be pleasant. I hated that I wondered if it was always that lovely. 

“You might not have enough credits to graduate, then. I’m sorry, it’s simply too late.”

“If it’s a matter of credits, I will happily take on an independent study next—” he stopped speaking as the door opened again and a gust of moist air blew past me, rustling the papers on the desk. It seemed there was a storm coming. 

The boy had gone rigid, and his voice lost all of its smooth charm. “Nevermind. I can see that it’s impossible.” 

The other girl hastily stepped inside and moved to shut the door, but before she could manage it the Cullen boy was there, standing beside me and glaring daggers as he rushed right out into the rain and disappeared again. 

The girl paused in surprise for a moment but then moved over toward the desk and continued on with her mission. I, however, could hardly move. 

I was so abruptly, righteously furious that I was shaking.

Who did that boy think he was?

  
  



	4. Chapter Three - Games

Charlie could tell I was angry when he got home. I had been unable to shake it off while doing my homework and making dinner, but I worried that he would misinterpret my mood as being a problem with him, so I managed to deflate before we sat down to eat. 

I somehow answered all his questions about school without mentioning the Cullens or the strange hostility one of them harbored for me. It didn’t seem right to open up that discussion given that he knew everyone in this town, including the Cullens. I didn’t need rumors getting started on an overreaction. Or worse, a restraining order. 

He was happy to hear the names of the people in Jessica’s friend group. Apparently, he had never had any trouble with them or their families which made them good people in his eyes. His worry over my social life must have eased off a bit. 

That night, I did not sleep well. I couldn’t stop mulling over the strange encounters I’d had with the Cullen boy. I kept comparing his actions in the cafeteria with his actions in Biology and then again with the way he had seemed in the front office. His face kept reappearing in my mind, scowling at me and glaring as though I had offended his delicate sensibilities. 

Was it me? I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong, but that hardly mattered to a psychopath. (I had begun to call him psychopath in my head as a way to release some of the anger. It was childish but it felt good.) Clearly, he took issue with some aspect of my existence. 

But which part?

The next day, I dressed properly for the weather, donning one of Charlie’s old heavy raincoats over my jeans and top. There was nothing I could do about my porous shoes at the moment, though. I desperately needed a shopping trip. 

The rain was already going strong when I left the house. It clung to everything like a spider’s web and poured in rivers over the asphalt. It occurred to me that a boat might be a more efficient means of transportation. My Frankentruck proved up to the task, however, and ferried me safety across the soggy town. 

Today, I was determined to do one thing and one thing only: confront the Cullen boy and find out what his problem was. After going around and around in circles about it, I had come to the conclusion it was hopeless. If I couldn’t get over my need to know why he was treating me like this, then I had only one option. I had to talk to him and force him to explain.

My eyes began searching for him from the moment I parked. I was motivated primarily by spite and curiosity. Tyler and Angela spotted me as I got out of my car, and I waved in greeting toward them as I continued to look around. 

He was nowhere to be seen, but my eyes did catch once more on the shiny black SUV that had sped into the lot yesterday morning. This time when I stared at it, however, I saw four people climbing out. 

The Cullens. Of course. Hastily, I searched their faces, but there were only four distinct figures and my lab partner was not among them. 

Dismayed but not deterred, I caught up with Angela and Tyler on their way up to the school. 

All morning I was distracted, restless, eager to get to lunch and finally have this matter settled. Jessica and Mike were trying to include me in future plans for parties and weekend trips to the beach, but I could barely do more than smile and say, “sounds fun.” I wasn’t sure what all I agreed to. 

At lunch, however, the Cullen boy still hadn’t appeared. It seemed likely that he wasn’t in school today.

My hypothesis was confirmed when he didn’t show up in Biology either. 

This seemed to faze no one but myself. Even my Biology teacher merely frowned at his seat and then continued on as usual. No rumors sprung up about his disappearance. It seemed that no one cared besides me. 

The rest of the week went on in this manner. By Friday, I had finally stopped being surprised, though I hadn’t managed to stop wondering if I was the reason he was gone.

My weekend was looking up. I had agreed to plans with Jessica and Angela to hang out on Saturday, but on Friday night Jacob and Billy Black came over for more sports and fish. 

Jacob and I stayed outside again talking and avoiding our fathers. 

“I see you haven’t hit any trees,” he said, walking around the Frankentruck to examine her for nicks and dents. 

I laughed. “As if you could tell if I had.”

“I could tell,” he said proudly, running a hand through his hair. “I know where every previous nick and dent are. A new one would be easy to spot.” 

“Sure it would.” I rolled my eyes. 

He came back to sit beside me, resting his elbows on his knees. I was grateful the rain had stopped for the moment so we didn’t have to stay indoors. I professed a deep loathing of cold wet things, but I didn’t hate the cool breeze or the soft rustling trees. Maybe it was simply the company helping me think on the positive side. Having Jacob to talk to put the Cullen boy out of my head for a while. 

But as soon as I remembered him, I was filled with annoyance again. Jacob seemed to notice.

“Something is bugging you,” he observed. 

I sighed. “It’s nothing...probably. Someone bothered me on the first day of school, but I haven’t seen them since then. I can’t tell if they’re avoiding me, since I don’t know why they would want to.” 

He was quiet for a moment. “Bothered you how?”

“It was more of a...feeling that they didn’t like me. Before they even met me! Their behavior was so strange—they didn’t act hostile toward anyone else, so why…?” I trailed off in thought, then snorted. “Listen to me! I sound so self-absorbed. I really don’t expect everyone to like me or anything. It’s ridiculous.”

“No, I think I get it,” Jacob said thoughtfully. “It’s normal to wonder what someone is thinking when they treat you differently.” 

The way he said that made me look at him. “Does someone treat you differently, Jacob?”

He blushed, something he did when he was embarrassed, and looked away from me. “Not...like they hate me. It’s probably all in my head.”

I doubted that. Jacob was very level headed. 

I lowered my chin and cracked my knuckles. “You need me to beat someone up for you?”

Jacob started laughing and shoved me away. “Get real! As if you could take on Sam Uley.” The mental image seemed to make him laugh harder. “You’re practically skin and bones compared to him.” 

I smiled at his amusement. He continued to enumerate all the reasons I couldn’t beat anyone in a fight, and I protested, claiming to have led a girl gang in Phoenix and all sorts of other outlandish things. 

The Blacks left after dinner and I helped Charlie clean up the house. He kept glancing my way, working up the courage to say something, until finally I just asked him what was up.

“You seem happy, Bells,” he said. “It’s just nice to see, that’s all.”

I was happy. Happier than I’d been all week. Jacob had not called me crazy for being frustrated with the Cullen boy’s behavior, but just telling him about it made it seem ridiculous now. I was letting it darken my mood and the boy hadn’t even talked to me. I felt silly. It was good.

My improved mood followed me all the way to Angela’s house, and I found that Jessica wasn’t nearly as hard to talk to when she wasn’t at school. Here, in the safety of Angela’s room, she let her hair down and laughed as we bickered about which movies to watch. 

Talk turned to boys. Jesica ran through a list of the perfect guys for Angela to ask to one of the upcoming dances, which made Angela squirm and turn red, but since I had barely talked to any boys at school besides Tyler, Eric, and Mike, I couldn’t contribute much. I told Jessica she should ask Mike. She refused to admit to having a crush on him, but told me, point blank, “He’s like, obsessed with you Bella.” 

I shuddered, shaking my head. “The feeling is  _ not _ mutual.”

That seemed to please her, but she continued to deny any attachment herself. 

A moment or two passed, and then she said, “It’s not just Mike, you know. It’s Eric and Tyler too.”

I could see this needed to be settled. I sat up straighter and raised both hands. “I swear, I really don’t like any of them that way. There is no one who has caught my eye at school.” I realized as soon as I said it that it was a lie, but I refused to think about the Cullen boy any more than I already had. 

Jessica sighed. “You know that Lauren likes Tyler, right?” When I raised a brow, she went on. “That’s why she acts like that towards you—and she keeps talking about you behind your back like you’re some succubus out to steal all the guys at school.” She rolled her eyes. 

Well, that was one mystery solved. I wondered if Jessica had been a willing participant in these jealous discussions, but I stopped those questions in their tracks. It didn’t matter what Jessica might have thought about me in the beginning. My thoughts hadn’t been the kindest either. We were both still learning about each other.

Not to be put down, however, I lifted my chin, flipped my hair over my shoulder, and sighed in a dramatic fashion. “It’s truly a burden, being this beautiful.”

Jessica snorted and rolled into a laughing Angela, who toppled into me and nearly knocked me off her bed. They both bashed me soundly for having such a big head, and I accepted such punishment as a small price to pay for keeping the peace. We struggled to compose ourselves after that, once all the tension had been broken. Talk drifted far away from school for the rest of the day. 

Thank goodness we all got along so well. I had a feeling I wouldn’t feel like a goldfish much longer. 

I was glad I’d agreed to come, after Saturday. Living here was already proving easier now that I’d gotten past the first week and made friends. It was good to find that I had been right in coming to Forks, despite the dismal weather. 

The rest of the weekend passed uneventfully. I managed to find a shop to purchase a warm rain jacket from and wound up buying rain-proof boots in Mike Newton’s family’s sporting outlet. He followed me around the store like a puppy, showing me way more things than I wanted or needed. At several points, I started to tell him that I was uncomfortable, but I was still hoping that his excessive regard might naturally fade with time. 

Plus, this weekend had been so good. I didn’t want Monday to be awkward.

I shouldn’t have bothered, because the second that I parked in the school lot on Monday morning, singing along to the radio, I spotted him. 

The Cullen boy. 

He was leaning on the hood of the black SUV with his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, seemingly waiting for something. 

Waiting for me? I couldn’t help but wonder. Just as I had that first day in the cafeteria, I sensed I was being watched, but it was hard to tell for sure that he was the source because a pair of black sunglasses covered his eyes.

Well, it was freezing and there was a bit of a glare today, but I hardly thought a slightly lighter overcast sky warranted shades. Whatever. 

Before I could start to do exactly what I had promised myself I would not do, I turned away from him and latched onto Jessica as she was headed up the steps to school. 

The morning classes passed quickly, but my anxiety seemed to increase the closer I got to lunch. By the time the bell rang, I was braced for a confrontation but dreading it as well. 

How did I even begin to address him?

The boy wasn’t at lunch, however. The rest of the Cullens were, but not him. It was exactly as it had been the last four days at school. The other Cullens talked and laughed and ignored everyone outside their family, but one member was notably absent. 

As I sat down, I contemplated whether I had imagined him this morning. Maybe I was so anxious that I was now conjuring him from thin air. 

Biology, however, proved that theory to be false. 

He was sitting at our table before most of the class had even arrived. He hadn’t taken off his jacket but his glasses were nowhere to be seen. Compared to last Monday, his posture was relaxed and I sensed no outward hostility. 

But he was definitely waiting for me. 

I stopped inside the doorway, assessing the situation under the guise of hanging up my raincoat. He smiled as if he knew I was stalling. 

It was unfortunate that my heart stuttered a little at that smile. It was doubly unfortunate that I had a thing for leather jackets. 

Slowly, one step at a time, I walked toward him and set my bag beside my chair, but didn’t sit. This wasn’t a conversation I wanted to be on equal terms. 

What kind of game were we playing? 

“Hello,” he said. 

I crossed my arms, frowning. 

That seemed to make him hesitate. “Bella, right?” 

My knee-jerk reaction was to correct him, as I had been correcting people all week about my name, but he had gotten it right somehow. 

I must have paused too long thinking it over. 

“Am I mistaken?” he prodded.

“No, it’s just that I usually have to make a point of telling people my name is Bella, not Isabella as my father does behind my back.”

He paused, but amended. “Your efforts have been paying off, then. I wasn’t even aware it was a nickname.” 

Hm. I shrugged, not knowing what he was expecting me to say in response to that. 

It was obvious he was struggling, but I was sort of enjoying myself. His unexplained animosity had given me a week of frustration. He deserved to squirm and I deserved an apology. 

“Ah,” he seemed to realize something. He stood suddenly and was all smiles again. “My name is Edward Cullen.”

Why did he stand just to introduce himself? I didn’t like that he was taller than me. When sitting, I had felt all the power of the high ground, but now he’d gone and upset the playing field. I narrowed my eyes. He smirked, as if he could read my thoughts. 

“Edward…” I played with his name on my tongue. It was old fashioned.

“I apologize for not introducing myself before.” He looked so contrite all of the sudden that I didn’t trust it. “I was sick that day. It’s why I did not come back until now.” 

“Is that what you apologize for?” I asked. Maybe I was being rude, but I had no time for empty apologies. 

It might have also been a slightly desperate attempt to reestablish some control in this conversation, but at least at that it seemed to work. 

This time, the expression of regret that flashed across his face was genuine. “Ah, I’m making excuses, aren’t I?” He shoved his hands into his pockets. “I’m very sorry. I was abominably rude to you that day, and no illness could possibly excuse such behavior. I promise, you will never see me act in such a manner again.” 

Damn. That was a good follow up. I looked away. “Alright. Thank you.” 

He glanced at the front of the classroom and then turned toward our table. “Class is starting.” 

I sat in my chair and faced forward, not relaxed in the slightest but mollified by the fact that he—Edward—didn’t sit at an exaggerated distance from me. Today, he was the picture of a normal high school boy, if normal high school boys could look like angels in Renaissance paintings wearing leather jackets. 

Class began and boredom gripped me. Our lab today was something I had done before. Science had never been a subject I struggled with, but Forks High School lacked the advanced curriculum I was accustomed to in Phoenix so it was even less challenging than usual. 

I sighed as the teacher set the beat up box of supplies down at our table. 

Edward looked at me curiously. “Not your area of interest?”

I glanced at him and pulled the microscope out of the box. “What? No, I love Biology.” 

This frustrated him, drawing his perfect brows together. “Oh, I assumed from your sigh…”

“I’ve done this lab before.”

“I see.” He picked up the slides and began arranging them on the table. “Where did you last study Biology?” 

“Arizona.” 

“That’s quite a difference in climate. You must either hate the desert or really like mountains.” He chuckled. 

I raised one eyebrow at him. Did he usually talk this way, just assuming one thing after another? “Not exactly.” 

He was quiet for a moment. “You don’t seem unhappy to be here.”

_ Is it any of your business? _ I looked at him in exasperation. “No one is forcing me to be here, if that’s what you’re implying.” As I said this, looking into his eyes, I realized they were different than they had been last Monday. My memory was clear: his eyes had been black, but now they were the striking color of amber. Without thinking, I blurted, “Oh, did you get new contacts?”

His head snapped away. “No,” he said, but he cringed slightly as if regretting that answer. 

I tried to stifle my amusement, but a smile escaped. Was he embarrassed? At least my question got him to stop prying into my life like Mike and Eric did. 

Rather than press the issue, I picked up the first slide and fixed it into the microscope before peering through the eyepiece. 

“Prophase,” I said after a moment, picking up my pen to write it down. 

Edward tugged the microscope toward himself, peering in before switching out the slides. It seemed cursory. Perhaps I shouldn’t have told him I’d done this before. 

I waited for him to identify the next slide. 

“Anaphase,” he said after barely peering through the lens. 

I wrote it down, but I double checked before switching out the slides. He was right. 

We took turns like that until we had filled out the worksheet. Neither of us felt anything less than certainty that our answers were correct, which meant we had the lab finished in about five minutes while everyone else was still struggling and debating. Mike was scratching his head across the room. I carefully placed everything back in the box. 

Edward rested his temple on a propped-up fist and drummed his fingers on the table with his other hand. He was studying me. “So...if not for the lovely weather, what brings you to Forks?”

I mirrored his posture, smirking. He and his family had also not been here long. “You first.” 

His fingers stilled, but he conceded the fairness of my question. “My mother likes small towns.”

The simplicity of his explanation surprised me, though it shouldn’t have. I tried to whittle down my own explanation into a single sentence. “My mother and stepfather moved to Florida.” 

One of his eyebrows quirked up. “So, it was either sunny Atlantic beaches or rainy Pacific cliffs, and you chose the latter?” 

I nodded. 

He searched for some new assumption to make. “Do you dislike your stepfather?” 

“No, Phil is good for my mother and loves me.” 

“You must have missed your father, then.”

“Charlie and I haven’t been close since I was seven.”

“Then...I give up.” He conceded, his eyes twinkling as if he was happy not to have any of it make sense. 

I felt a little smug in my victory. “It’s a long story.” 

“I’d like to hear it sometime.” 

The way his tone changed when he said that had me looking at him, really looking at him, again. This was the voice he had used with the secretary, when he was trying to be charming, because he wanted to escape taking this class with me. He was making an effort to put me at ease, but I could still see his angry glare and the disgust that had flashed on his face. No matter how casual our conversation was, that still bothered me. 

I frowned and straightened in my seat, replaying the scene from that day as he left the building in my mind. I’d gotten sucked in and forgotten my pride. There were things he still hadn’t answered for.

Edward had a confused look on his face and opened his mouth, probably to ask what had changed, but was stalled from speaking.

“Well, Edward, didn’t you think our new student should have a chance to learn from this assignment?” our teacher said, looking down at our completed paper. 

Apparently, finishing assignments ahead of schedule was something Edward did often, and hearing the teacher accuse him of having done all the work had me flushing with indignation. Edward quickly redirected to me, however, which changed the teacher’s tune from disapproving to overly eager.  _ Yes, I’ve done this lab before. Yes, I was in an advanced course of study.  _ He was no better than the rest of them, and peppered me with questions that kept Edward and I from continuing our conversation. 

But I didn’t miss that Edward seemed amused as he shamelessly eavesdropped. 

The bell rang, eliciting a few groans from groups that hadn’t finished yet. The teacher walked around collecting other worksheets while we all shoved our belongings into our bags. 

Before I had managed to stand up, Mike materialized, waiting to guide me to my next class like the golden retriever he resembled. His expression, however, was laced with something I didn’t like and he kept shooting daggers at Edward with his eyes. 

“Mike,” I snapped when he looked like he might actually growl at Edward. “Let’s go.” 

He didn’t move immediately. 

I glanced over to see that Edward was goading this behavior on and rolled my eyes. Boys.

“Whatever,” I said, before grabbing my raincoat and stomping out the door into the snow. 


	5. Chapter Four - Superpowers

I hated snow. Rain was bad, but snow? Snow was my own personal arch nemesis. Snow was colder than rain and people didn’t run from it—they relished it. I couldn’t escape snow the way I could rain. Snow made me want to walk around outside with a blowtorch. 

This was not an opinion I shared very often, because we didn’t get snow in Phoenix—we barely got rain—and anywhere else, everyone loved snow and would have thought I was a psychopath. 

My drive home from school was treacherous. Not only were the roads slicker than normal but the white glare from the blankets of ice crystals reduced my visual acuity by at least fifty percent. 

And it didn’t let up over night.

When I awoke the next morning, the first thing I noticed was how bright it was outside my window. 

Deeply-ingrained instincts got their hopes up.  _ Sunshine! _ they screamed.  _ Finally! _ But when I looked out, the exact opposite greeted me. 

It was white as far as the eye could see. Don’t get me wrong, green still claimed dominion, but it was no longer the only thing holding the world hostage. 

More snow. Thicker snow, too. School would be a war zone of snowballs, I was certain. Battle lines would be drawn and everyone would track ice in on their coats. I would be soaked and freezing all day. 

And sighing a lot, as I was doing now. 

I dressed as warmly as possible, putting on two pairs of socks and leaving my thick hair down to act as both helmet and blanket. Even the smallest action could make a difference. 

Charlie was just leaving by the time I donned enough layers to make it downstairs. He had an expression on his face like he had been waiting for me. 

“Hey uh...I put some chains on your tires so you wouldn’t slide around,” he said, his voice gruff and a little tired. “Figured you probably weren’t used to driving in snow.” 

It took me a moment to remember what chains were and why I needed them. Then I smiled at him. Where would I be without Charlie? In a ditch, obviously. 

“Thanks, dad, I was worried about that.” I walked over and hugged him again. Charlie didn’t get enough hugs, but he was getting better at responding to them. I had to make up for all the years of distance. 

“No worries, Bells,” he grunted. “Drive with caution anyway, though. We get tons of calls on days like this.” 

_ I don’t want one of them to be about you, _ he implied. 

“Okay Chief,” I laughed and let him go. 

Sure enough, my back tires sported shiny metal nets that gripped the icy roads all the way to school. I also realized somewhat belatedly that my Frankentruck had nothing to fear from the other shiny metal cans sliding around. Rather, I feared for them should they lose grip and find themselves wrapping around my back bumper. 

I was so caught up in amusement as I hopped out of my truck at school that I didn’t see him at first. 

He was standing where he had been yesterday morning, but today he had switched out his leather jacket for a long wool coat that looked designer and fit him like a glove. Those sunglasses were covering his eyes again, but the bright snow did something magical to his perfectly disheveled hair. Most days, he was a bright marble statue, but today he seemed softer, like living bronze. 

I didn’t question that he was watching me. I was watching him as well. Our game from yesterday had not yet ended. 

I stood by my truck deliberating for a few heartbeats, then steeled my resolve and started walking directly toward him. 

His lips curled into a smile. 

A sudden, ear-splitting screeching sound stopped me mere feet from my truck. It was something I had only heard in movies, and my brain sensed danger but I didn’t know from where. If I’d reacted better, I might have been able to get out of the way or gotten back in my truck, but I didn’t. 

I heard people shouting next, and that drew my attention more than anything. Several people were waving and yelling to me with wide eyes and open mouths. 

Edward was one of them, only he wasn’t standing far away by his car any longer—somehow, he had closed half the distance between us while I had only taken one step. I couldn’t make out what he shouted over the noise, all I could see was his mouth moving and his bright eyes widening with fear. 

The danger finally caught my eye, then, but I knew somehow that I had turned too late in its direction. I had just enough mental wherewithal to understand that the flat side of a minivan was sliding across the slick black asphalt toward me and that it was too late for me to avoid a collision course. 

It was going to crush me, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. In my final moments, I heard screaming and brakes failing and felt my heart leap into my throat. 

And then, without warning, I was tackled to the ground. A solid, heavy force barreled into my chest, knocking the air from my lungs. As my body met the ground, my skull smacked the asphalt with an audible crack that had my ears ringing and spots bursting in my vision. I only sensed that I was sliding on my back across the ground because the world wasn’t spinning—it was going too fast. 

A dark shape hovered over me, and I saw the rusted red hue of my truck behind it. Then, there was a sickening crunch like the sound of metal eating metal and the tinkling of shattered glass fragments dancing across the blacktop. The dark figure above me cursed, and I blinked to see clearly that it was him.

Impossibly, it was Edward. He was crouched above me with his hands outstretched toward the minivan, which had curved around them as if they were as solid and immovable as stone. The front and back ends of the totaled vehicle just barely touched the front and back ends of the Frankentruck. As expected, my truck didn’t show any signs of impact. 

I became aware that I was gasping for breath, and Edward looked down at me with wide, concerned eyes as he assessed me. We were wedged in the small space between the cars, cut off from the other students and staff in the lot. I heard them calling my name, but knew they wouldn’t be able to see us. We were all alone. 

After a few moments to focus on my breathing, my heart rate lowered and the flow of adrenaline seemed to ebb. There was a dull, throbbing pain at the back of my skull, and winced as I moved my neck to inspect it. 

“Careful,” Edward said, leaning over me and gently prodding the side of my head with his fingers. 

All thoughts of pain abruptly took a number as I became aware of how close the boy’s face now was to my own. I swallowed involuntarily and my heart rate shot up again. Stupid hormones. Well, clearly I wasn’t dying. 

“Can you sit up?” he asked me, glancing down into my eyes. I wondered if they betrayed me, but his expression never wavered from concern. 

“Yes, I think so,” I answered. My voice was rough and I cleared it as he sat back to assist me. 

Sitting up caused my vision to swim for a moment, but I felt his hands as a steadying grip on my upper arms. Slowly, I raised one hand to the back of my head and gingerly prodded the spot where my skull had kissed the pavement. I wondered if my helmet of hair had saved me after all. 

“No blood,” Edward assured me wryly. He leaned back against my truck as he released my arms. I found myself wishing he wouldn’t, but my attention shifted quickly to other things. 

Such as the hand-shaped dents in the side of the minivan curved like a croissant around us. I blinked at them, momentarily convinced that my vision was still playing tricks on me, but they didn’t disappear. 

“You...stopped it.” I said in awe.

Edward didn’t reply. Instead, he frowned at the minivan as if it had offended him. I noticed that his sunglasses were gone now. His amber eyes were bright and his appearance was unusually ruffled. His fancy coat was soaked in some places and dotted with snow in others. His hair, which always had an artfully tousled appearance, now looked slightly windblown. The sight made me want to reach over and touch it. 

And then I remembered seeing him across the lot, leaning relaxed against his SUV. Somehow, he had run the entire car-filled distance between us in less than the amount of time it took for the minivan to slide twenty feet across black ice and almost crush me. 

I remembered the sensation of being tackled to the ground. I had the headache to prove it. 

I also remembered the way his hands had braced to stop the van from crushing us. The dents were enough to prove that. 

Just how fast could he run? Just how strong was he? 

I must have been staring at him, because he looked over and chuckled. 

“Did you know that when you frown, you get this little dent between your eyebrows?” he said, pointing one long pale finger at my face. 

My frown deepened into a scowl, which made him laugh harder, his hair falling into his eyes. 

I was prevented from retorting by the sound of a police siren pulling into the parking lot. Even hunched down between two cars I could see the reflection of flashing red and blue lights in the glass. Dread filled me, and I groaned. 

Edward looked at me questioningly. 

“Charlie,” I explained, already shifting my weight. “Help me stand. I don’t want him worrying more than he has to.” 

Edward did as instructed, steadying me by my elbow just as my father’s face appeared over the bed of my truck. His eyes were wild and panicked as he examined what he could see from that angle. He was clearly rattled. This morning’s conversation replayed in my mind, so I understood. 

I smiled reassuringly at him. It didn’t seem to help. 

“Bella! Hold on honey, I’m coming to get you out,” he declared, moving to the back end of the truck as if he was about to climb up into the bed and lift me out himself.

Panic filled me. He was more likely to hurt himself than help me. 

“Wait! Dad, no I’m fine! We’re fine. Stop,” I pleaded, raising my hands over the lip of the cab to show him I had free range of movement. “Just get the van out of the way, please?”

He paused at my insistence and looked from me to Edward and back again. It took a moment, but some of the stress seemed to leave him and he nodded. 

“Okay, just hang tight, kid. We’re working on it. The driver’s banged up pretty bad but we’ll have the EMTs in there in a few minutes.” 

I nodded, smiling again, and watched him disappear once more, slightly worried he might not follow my instructions forever. 

Edward cleared his throat to get my attention. “We’ll have to go to the hospital.” 

Ugh. Hospitals. I frowned. “No we won’t. We’re fine.” 

“Bella,” he moved to stand directly in front of me, his height working to full advantage in the small space. His voice dropped into that lovely, soft persuasive tone that I was starting to really despise. I peered up at him and waited. “We were almost crushed by a van today. Normally when that happens, people go to the hospital.” 

“Does any of this seem normal to you?” I gestured around us at the two cars and the broken glass.

His lips twitched. “Car accidents aren’t very common occurrences, and surviving them unscathed is even less common.” 

“Unscathed?” I pointed at the handprints in the side of the minivan. I wondered what excuse he would use for those. Probably none I would like. 

I could hear my father shouting along with several other adult men, probably the EMTs, as they moved around the other side of the minivan. They would have us freed any minute now. 

Edward schooled his face into a mask of calm rationality. “What I meant was, you hit your head pretty hard—”

“Stop that,” I snapped, trying to push him away. There was no give when my hands met his chest. It was like trying to move a wall. He didn’t even budge, and his eyes actually crinkled in amusement at my efforts. 

I was so going to slap him one day. Maybe today. 

I set my jaw and glared up at him. “Look, I’m sick and tired of your lies. First you treat me like a leper and you run away. Then suddenly, you show up again claiming you want to be friends all while skirting around the loathing that I know you felt. Now you’re stopping motor vehicles from crushing me with your bare—”

“Quiet,” he cut me off, turning his head just as a loud shout rang out and the minivan shifted an inch. More dislodged glass shards clinked on the ground. The EMTs were finally moving the minivan. 

“No,” I said stubbornly, gritting my teeth. 

A tinge of wild desperation appeared in his eyes as he faced me once more. “Bella, trust me, you don’t want to do this here.” 

“Trust you?” I nearly laughed. “You’ve done nothing to earn my trust.” 

“Really?” he snapped, his eyes brightly flashing. “Nothing?” 

I was quiet for a moment. The minivan rattled again as they continued shifting it. 

“You owe me an explanation,” I said flatly. 

“Even if I give you one, will you accept it?” he asked. 

“If it’s the truth, yes.” 

Edward Cullen closed his eyes and sighed. 

I appeared to have hit the root of the issue. He didn’t intend to tell me the truth. 

Neither of us spoke after that. 

It took them about ten minutes to create an opening large enough to squeeze through. An EMT entered the small space and gave us both a quick examination before telling us we had to go to the hospital, as Edward had said would be the case. 

My protests against this fell on deaf ears, especially after Edward mentioned that I’d hit my head. I was bundled immediately into the back end of an ambulance against my will. I saw Edward standing off to one side, talking with his siblings as if it was any normal day, and resented the imbalance of our situations. 

Why did he get special treatment? 

It appeared the other Cullens were upset and his expression was deathly serious as he spoke, but when he caught me glaring, I swear he smirked. 

I seethed quietly. If Edward thought I’d let this go, he was sorely mistaken. 

In the end, three of us ended up going to the hospital: myself, Edward, and Tyler, who, as it turned out, had been driving the minivan. According to the EMT, Tyler had been driving too fast upon entering the parking lot and had lost control on a patch of black ice. He was in much worse shape than I was (thanks to Edward) but his car would be the biggest of his worries (also thanks to Edward). 

We were all assigned to adjacent beds in the emergency room, separated by curtains that weren’t pulled out very far. This was by far the smallest hospital that I had ever set foot in. Although, I reminded myself, I was born here. Still, the number of beds was limited and the equipment was slightly outdated. I supposed it didn't matter much when the average patient was just someone who got a sprain on the trails or mauled by a bear. 

I couldn't hear what magic words Edward used to convince the nurses he was fine, but they let him get up and walk away while I was poked and prodded and told to lie still for what seemed like forever. 

This situation was doubly uncomfortable because Tyler was in the bed on my other side and would not stop apologizing. 

My first reaction upon seeing Tyler had been concern. He was cut up in about a hundred places and blood had soaked the fabric of his shirt. It made me queasy to watch, but the nurses were bandaging him up pretty fast and it seemed that someone had given him a numbing shot in anticipation of stitches. He wasn’t just in worse shape, he was in bad shape—and to top it off, as far as he knew, he’d totaled his car. 

But my sympathy soon evaporated as he refused to believe that I accepted his first apology and didn’t place any blame upon him at all. 

“I’m so sorry, Bella,” he kept saying. “I’m so—I didn’t see you until after. I had no idea I was going so fast. I’m so sorry—”

“Tyler, seriously, I’m fine!” I kept cutting him off, but it was useless. 

“Is your car okay? I can’t believe I almost killed you and your car, Bella! I can’t tell you how sorry I am, I—” He was like a broken record. 

“My car is fine, Tyler, I promise,” I assured him. If this bump on my head didn’t give me a headache, Tyler surely would. 

“But, how?” He was saying now. “I saw your car, it was right there, I was going to smack right into it, and if you were in the middle…”

I froze, hoping he wasn’t really asking, but much to my dismay he was looking at me and waiting for my account of events. 

“Actually, Edward saved me,” I said, wishing my cheeks didn’t get hot when I said his name. 

This fact seemed to confuse Tyler greatly. “Edward...Cullen?” 

How had he not noticed Edward in the other bed before? “Yep,” I said, hoping that would end it.

But Tyler wasn’t satisfied. His face was all scrunched up. “How?”

How? I didn’t even know how. What did he expect me to tell him? He wouldn’t believe me if I described what I really saw. I wanted answers from Edward about that, and I knew the way to getting them necessitated not spilling his secrets to the whole town. 

Well, it was too late to change my story now, so I just made it up. “He was talking to me when your car skidded, and he pushed me down, out of the way.” That last bit was true, at least. But there was still the not-small matter of those hand-shaped dents in his side door. “I think my truck is tougher than you give it credit for. It was all kind of a blur though, I’m sorry Tyler.” 

Luckily—or unluckily, depending on how one looked at it—my apology sent Tyler into another repeating cycle of, “Sorry, Bella!” and I was forced to tune him out. 

Soon enough, I was wheeled off for tests which definitively concluded that nothing was broken. I didn’t even have a concussion, but they still wouldn’t let me leave until I’d seen a doctor.

This meant that I was stuck in the ER waiting and suffering through the application of Tyler’s stitches. The curtain had been pulled as far as possible, but it wasn’t far enough for me. In order to avoid thinking about it too much, I laid down and closed my eyes and pretended I was anywhere else. 

After about five minutes, Edward joined me. I didn’t hear his arrival—how did he walk so quietly?—but lucky for me it was heralded by Tyler, who immediately turned his loud professions of remorse onto him. 

“No blood, no foul,” Edward said calmly. “Please focus on yourself.”

I was mad that I hadn’t thought to say that sooner, because Tyler stopped speaking immediately. 

Abruptly, I sat up and looked at Edward, only to find he was already looking at me. 

Our eyes met and held. The expression on his face was a new one. It was neither angry nor friendly. He seemed entirely at ease. 

“So why aren’t they chaining you to a bed?” I demanded. 

“I have connections,” he shrugged. “Do you have a concussion?” 

“No, but they still won’t let me leave until a doctor speaks with me,” I complained. 

He laughed. “Oh, doctors aren’t so bad.” 

On this point, I was inclined to disagree strongly, but at that precise moment a doctor in a pristine white lab coat walked into the room, and I was forced to do a double-take. Was I dreaming? Did they film a soap opera at this hospital? Surely this blond angel did not possess a medical license. My eyes refused to look away, and as a result, I soon noticed other things that piqued my intrigue. 

For instance, he was more than handsome—he was impossibly so, and also extremely pale-skinned like Edward. Unlike Edward, however, there was nothing about him that raised my defenses. He walked with confidence, smiling easily and talking with the hospital staff so naturally that he might have worked here his whole life. 

Was this Edward’s adopted father, then? He was so young. I glanced at Edward to see that he was staring at the doctor with a slight frown. What was that about? 

When Dr. Cullen finally reached us, I tried to refrain from studying him too obviously. I might not have succeeded, though, because Edward smirked at me as if to say,  _ I told you so.  _ Wasn’t he just frowning? Why couldn’t he just pick an emotion and stick with it? 

“Hello, Miss Swan,” Dr. Cullen said, taking my x-ray images out of a large folder and wedging them into a nearby lightboard before turning it on. “My name is Carlisle Cullen. My son Edward may have mentioned me.” This was not precisely the case, but I felt it would be rude to say so. He was busy studying my x-rays, anyway. “You appear not to have broken anything. How does your head feel?”

I tilted it from side to side and shrugged. “I feel fine.” 

“May I?” Dr. Cullen stepped forward when I assented and gently prodded the back of my skull with his fingers, just as his son had done a few hours ago after the accident. Like father like son, it seemed. He caught my slight wince when he applied pressure and stepped away again. “Sore?” 

“Not very,” I lied. 

Edward chuckled, invalidating my statement, and I shot a glare at him. 

Dr. Cullen smiled kindly at me. “A bump is nothing too serious. However, I’m going to recommend that you stay home from school today to recover from the stress. Your father is waiting to take you home. Come back to see me if you start to feel dizzy or nauseated.” 

“Can I please go back to school?” I begged. I was not above begging. 

“Leave it to me,” Edward said. “I’ll be sure to let everyone know you’re alive.” 

“That may not be necessary,” Dr. Cullen interjected as he was signing the discharge documents. “I believe half the school is in the waiting room.” 

Fewer statements could fill me with as much dread as that one. I rubbed my face with my hands and groaned at the mere thought of facing everyone right now. 

“Has your pain increased?” Dr. Cullen asked with concern. 

“No!” I protested, perhaps too vehemently. 

This seemed to worry Dr. Cullen, but Edward suddenly winked at me and said, “Don’t worry. I’ll sneak you out.” 

I was too stunned by his playful wink to form any decent arguments, but this plan gave me what I wanted anyway: a chance to talk to Edward alone. I accepted the paperwork that Dr. Cullen handed to me as I hopped off the bed and followed his son out into the hallway. 

  
  



	6. Chapter Five - Terms

The hallway was quiet and, I assumed, far enough away from the waiting room that no one would overhear us while we talked. 

“Alright,” I stopped him midway down the corridor and made him turn to face me. The playfulness of a few moments prior had vanished. “You’ve managed to save my life twice today, and I want to start by saying that I’m grateful to you—I really am.” He looked away, apparently uncomfortable with my gratitude. I continued anyway. “But I’ve also lied for you today, and I have a feeling that I’m going to have to lie again, maybe even for the rest of my life, so I need you to tell me why I should.” 

I could practically see his mind working to formulate an answer that would appease me. After several tense heartbeats however, he sighed in frustration and gave up. “It’s useless, Bella.” His expression was carefully guarded, but I wasn’t sure why he was letting me see that. “Nothing I can say would be the truth you’re seeking, and you’ve already made it perfectly clear that I haven’t earned your trust, but please—” He suddenly looked earnest. “Just stick to the story you told Tyler.”

“How did you hear what I told Tyler?” I demanded. 

“I hear things,” he hedged, crossing his arms. “That isn’t important. It was a good story. If anyone else asks, just repeat it, or tell them you don’t remember clearly—tell them anything but what you really think you saw. Can you do that much?” 

A part of me was mollified by this. He wasn’t trying to convince me that what I saw wasn’t real, and he was insinuating that there were important reasons I couldn’t know more than I suspected. That was certainly a start. 

But he was still asking me to lie for him while leaving me in the dark, and I didn’t appreciate it. Was he testing me, to see if he could trust me? 

Maybe I could pose a test of my own, then. 

I straightened as I came to a conclusion. He was watching me carefully, cautiously, waiting for my response. 

“Alright, I will lie for you, just about this, and I won’t demand the full story...on one condition.”

Immediately, he was on the defensive. He frowned and his face went completely blank, shut off. 

“What is your condition?” he asked harshly. 

Anger stoked, I pointed at him. “Never lie to me again. That’s the sure-fire way to lose my trust.” He started to argue, but I held up my hand to warn him against it. Begrudgingly, he pressed his lips together again. “I’m not saying you have to tell me things that are none of my business, but instead of lying about something, just keep your mouth shut.” I took a deep breath, braced for this next bit. “But also...”

He was clearly displeased with this already. 

“If I figure it out on my own—if I guess correctly or learn the truth in some other way—this means that you have to acknowledge it,” I finished.

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answers to, Bella.” His voice was low and even. Persuasive and intimidating. Old hat. 

I just shook my head. “I’m not capable of stopping myself from trying to figure things out, so don’t agree to this if you believe I’ll eventually lose interest and stop asking questions. I won’t.” This was something I knew about myself with absolute certainty. 

He paused, but it was impossible to tell what he was thinking as he did so. Finally he said, “And if I don’t agree?” 

“Then I won’t lie for you anymore.” 

Suddenly, he laughed. It was a loud, bitter kind of laugh, and his eyes were not kind when he stopped. “Did it ever occur to you that the reason I’m asking you not to tell the truth isn’t for my safety, but for yours?” 

That hadn’t occurred to me, but I merely shrugged it off. “Don’t worry about me.” 

“Do you think we would be in this position if I could stop worrying about you?” He hissed through clenched teeth. 

My gaze got caught in his and we both froze, reassessing one another. I wondered if he had intended to say that. I wondered what response he expected now that he had. 

“Why did you save my life, Edward?” I finally asked him. Was this another truth he couldn’t tell me, for my so-called protection? 

Apparently not, because he looked away, glaring out a window. “I don’t know.” 

Silence stretched on for what felt like an eternity. Deep down in my soul, I was hurt by his disregard and I hated it. This boy had saved my life, and yet he seemed almost conflicted about his decision to do so. And I was somehow still grateful. 

“Agree to my terms,” I demanded coldly. 

“I don’t think you’ll tell anyone what you saw,” he said, changing tactics. “No one will believe you, if you do. Carlisle will express concern for your head in jury, and that will be the end of it. You won’t risk being called crazy.” 

Of course I wouldn’t, but I had changed my tactics too. “Agree, or don’t talk to me again.” I said. Emotions were bubbling up into my voice, but I couldn’t stop them and I had to get this out. “Don’t try to befriend me, don’t save my life, don’t even glare angrily in my direction like you did on that first day.” He winced at the mention of it. “If you can’t be honest with me starting now, then we are nothing to each other. Those are my terms.” 

My statement brought him up short. His jaw slackened—he deflated quite a bit, gazing off into the distance. Whatever he was thinking, it seemed he had nothing left to argue against. 

Maybe this was what he had wanted all along. Maybe I should be hoping he just said, “fine,” and we went our separate ways. If the truth really would put me in danger, maybe it was for the best that we simply stopped whatever had started between us in its tracks. I still wanted to know the truth, but I was also aware he probably had more than enough power to prevent me from ever finding it on my own. 

I could only get close to him if he let me, and I could only ignore him if he ignored me. Whatever we did, we had to be on the same page about it. 

Seconds ticked by. I began to fear he would never answer me, but at last he did meet my gaze again. I couldn’t be sure what he saw on my face, but in his eyes I could clearly see he was torn. 

A new, strange feeling, almost like...hope, sprang up inside me as I realized what that implied. He wasn’t leaping at the chance to be rid of me, after all. 

Suddenly, I didn’t want an answer so desperately. I still needed the truth, but maybe what Edward needed was more time.

He opened his mouth to speak. 

“Wait,” I cut him off, my hands raised in a  _ stop  _ motion, eliciting a look of surprise and suspicion from him. “Don’t say anything. Just, tell me later, alright?” 

I didn’t give him a chance to protest. Smiling suddenly from the mere thought that I might get my answers if I could be patient, I stepped backward and retreated the way I’d come, leaving him standing in the middle of the hallway, staring after me. 

* * *

I had forgotten the reason I followed Edward in the first place. When I finally found the emergency waiting room, I was brought face to face with half the student body of Forks High and my overprotective father. 

Jessica, Mike, Eric, and Angela were all there. They converged, but I fended them off with a constant chorus of reassurances— _ I’m fine, not a scratch, Tyler is alive _ —while fighting my way to the exit. I was suddenly more than happy to go home and deal with all these problems tomorrow. A headache was beginning to form around my temples. 

Charlie drove me home in his cruiser. I would have to figure out how to get my truck later. He didn’t know whether or not they had towed Tyler’s van yet, but he wouldn’t have let me drive today anyway. 

Only one thing stood between me and blessed rest: my mother. 

I couldn’t exactly blame Charlie for calling her, but she had a tendency to overreact to my injuries and I wasn’t thrilled about the upcoming conversation.

“Before you say anything, mom, I promise I’m alright.” 

As anticipated, my mother was hysterical. She vacillated wildly between begging me to come home and being angry with Charlie, which he didn’t deserve. I reminded her that “home” was empty, but logic was useless. Nothing I said properly convinced her that I didn’t want to leave Forks. After nearly an hour of calming her down, my headache had become a full-blown migraine and I shamelessly used it as an excuse to hang up. 

I took some pain medication to dull the throbbing and fell blissfully into the soft arms of my comforter. Today had consisted of very little in the grand scheme of things, but I was drained more than I had been since coming to Forks. 

Even after my eyes closed however, I found myself replaying the conversation with Edward in my mind. 

Was I foolish to hope he might actually come around? I was banking an awful lot on a moment’s hesitation. Maybe I had read too much into it. Tomorrow, he could just as easily have solidified his decision to never talk to me again, and I had already told him I’d accept that. 

It had felt so good to put the ball in his court and be done with it, but the rising anticipation over what he would decide threatened to drive me mad. 

Sleep finally came for me, but it was less than restful. 

I dreamed of Edward. In the dream, he stood immobile before me, just like a statue, but no matter how many steps I took in his direction, he remained just out of reach. I grew exhausted from trying to get closer, and I knew that if he would only make a move in my direction—just a tiny step, that’s all—I could touch him, finally. 

But he never did.

I awoke in the early hours of the morning feeling frustrated and unsatisfied. Usually, my dreams were full of strange and ridiculous—sometimes even frightening—things, but they rarely made any sense. 

The meaning behind this dream was no mystery. I just hoped it wasn’t a premonition. 

The next day at school, however, proved that it might be. 

I was back to feeling like a goldfish. Other students and even teachers swarmed me all day long to talk about the accident. I found myself trying to be as vague as possible giving details and falling back on the story I’d told Tyler. My personal aversions to lying took a backseat to my desire to have people stop asking the same questions a thousand times over. I would have said just about anything to get away. 

Tyler also had not given up trying to make up for the accident. He followed me around at every opportunity and got on my very last nerve. Nothing I said to him convinced him of the truth, which was that I wanted nothing more than for everyone to forget the incident had ever happened. Jessica would have helped, but my sudden increase in fame was too alluring and she was completely distracted. Angela grew almost as unhappy with the attention as I did, but she couldn’t confront anyone on my behalf, least of all Tyler. I actually started seeking out more conversation with Mike simply because he was the best at getting Tyler to leave me alone for a while. I knew it was petty and probably would backfire, but I was getting desperate. 

I didn’t see Edward until lunchtime. Even if I had tried to talk to him, however, it would have been impossible with the large crowd that now surrounded my usual lunch table. 

At that point, I started to envy his family’s well-established aloofness. No strangers flocked to Edward’s table and demanded details of the accident, despite the fact that, as far as everyone knew, the both of us had been stuck in the middle of it for almost an hour, and because he’d saved my life, no less. That  _ was _ a key part of the story he’d asked me to stick to. Yet, no one seemed to really care. 

I decided that my only shot at getting an answer from him would be in Biology. 

I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up. 

He was there...physically. He didn’t precisely ignore me. But when I sat down, he made no effort to speak to me whatsoever, even after Mike finally went away. 

I greeted him. 

He glanced at me and nodded. 

And then several weeks passed by. 

* * *

Snow did not reappear again after the day of the accident. Clearly, it was content with the havoc it had wreaked and no longer felt the need to bother us. 

Edward and I had become exactly like strangers. He treated me with only slightly more regard than the other students at school, and that could easily be attributed to our having to share a table in Biology every day. 

He never gave me a direct answer to my proposal, but I could read between the lines. 

Though I was disappointed—more disappointed than I thought I would be given that I’d tried to prepare myself for rejection—life went on.

My fame finally faded and I was able to focus once more. I spent my weekends with Jess and Anglea more often than not, and I only thought about Edward’s strange, car-stopping super-strength when I was left alone with my thoughts for too long. My desire to have the mystery solved was still an itch I couldn’t scratch, but there was no point in letting it suck all the fun out of life. 

Shortly before Valentine’s Day, the entire school shifted focus to an upcoming girls-choice dance. Such a thing had never been organized at my old school, but I had very little interest in asking anyone to go with me anyway. 

Jessica, however, approached me one day in Spanish to talk about Mike.

“I think I’m going to ask him,” she admitted, somewhat timidly for her. It seemed she really liked him after all. 

“I think you should,” I told her. There were certainly better guys than Mike, in my opinion, but I didn’t want to discourage her from going after what she wanted. 

“Yeah?” she seemed enthused by my encouragement. “Do you mind, then...I mean he still sort of likes you, I know that, but...could you maybe help him look my way?” 

I smiled and assured her I would be more than happy to do so. It wasn’t lost on me that, if she was successful in catching Mike’s attention, he would stop waiting around for me. My interests were slightly selfish, but Mike needed to get a clue. 

Two days later, my opportunity to help Jessica arrived in Biology, of all places. He approached me before class started while I was sitting at my table studiously not talking to Edward. 

“Hey, Bella,” Mike said, fidgeting. “Did you hear that Jessica asked me to the spring dance?”

I smiled brightly at him. “She did? That’s great! You two will have a lot of fun.” 

He abruptly stopped fidgeting and frowned. “Oh. Well, I told her I had to think about it…” he trailed off.

“Mike,” I said with clear disapproval in my voice. “Why would you say that?” I knew why, but I needed him to say the words aloud. Maybe if he heard how he sounded, he’d realize how stupid he was being. 

His face had gone as red as a tomato. “Well...because I...was waiting to see if you would ask me?”

I paused for a moment, then sighed, shaking my head. “I’m not going to ask you, Mike.” I told him point blank. 

My frankness took him by surprise, and he sputtered a little. “Wh- Ah, I mean, have you already asked someone else?” 

“No,” I said slowly. “Mike, Jessica is awesome and she likes you. Don’t toy around with her. She won’t wait forever.” And also if he hurt her, I’d kill him. 

Mike’s expression turned indignant. “So are you just not going to go to the dance at all?” I wondered if he had even heard anything I said after “no.” 

“Dances aren’t my thing,” I said honestly. 

At last, he seemed to accept that I wasn’t going to go to the dance with him and his shoulders slumped dejectedly. “Oh, okay.” He looked at me for one more moment, as if hopeful it was some big prank, and then turned and walked back to his seat without another word.

I let out a relieved sigh and turned forward in my seat—and became aware that Edward was watching me. 

He must have been eavesdropping on that entire conversation. His expression was amused and a little smug. 

“Brilliantly done,” he praised. 

I raised an eyebrow at him. Of all the things he could say to me after a month of silence, this was what he decided to go with? 

“Oh, you haven’t noticed? Mike has been simmering for weeks, waiting for you to ask him to the dance. Frankly, I was a bit worried how he would react to your rejection. A part of me hoped he might really  _ snap _ , you know?” 

“How did you know I would reject him?” I asked with false lightness. In truth, Mike was the very last person I would ever consider romantically. “Mike and I talk all the time.”

Edward’s confidence didn’t waver. “I told you, I hear things.” 

Jessica must have mentioned liking Mike to more people than just me. I flipped my hair over my shoulder. “Well, let’s hope he doesn’t snap, for Jessica’s sake at the very least.” 

Edward let out a rather loud, rather sudden laugh, which caused nearly every head in the room to turn in his direction. I flushed, embarrassed by the way their eyes shifted immediately from Edward to me, but didn’t miss the furious expression that flashed on Mike’s face. 

I knew somehow that Edward had intended this. 

“Stop that,” I leaned over and hissed to him. 

He grinned at me, unrepentant, but didn’t continue laughing. 

Ugh. My face refused to calm down so I leaned away and pressed my palms to my cheeks, wishing they were cooler. Was this another of Edward’s superpowers, then? Frustrating me? 

“I think,” he said suddenly, “that I can finally answer your question.” 

There was nothing Edward could have said that would have felt more like a tidal wave smacking full-force into me, taking me under. 

“What?” I swear I asked him; but I couldn’t even hear my own voice. Everything went sort of fuzzy as I looked at him, and all I could feel was my heart beating like crazy. 

_ What is he doing to me?  _

“I said—” he started to repeat himself, but the teacher suddenly called his name and he turned away from me to say, “The Krebs Cycle.” 

I wasn’t even aware that class had started. 

Biology was the furthest thing from my mind. I tried to take notes, but it was a fruitless endeavor. Frustrated doodling was all I could manage, and that was just to prevent me from turning in my seat and glaring daggers at Edward. I didn’t absorb anything the teacher said. 

By the time the bell rang, I had determined that I didn’t care if I was skipping gym. Edward and I were going to finish our conversation right now. 

“Come with me,” I said, tossing my books and pen haphazardly into my bag and storming out the door. I didn’t bother looking back to see if he’d followed until I had marched right off the sidewalk and turned the corner toward the backside of the building. Woodlands jutted right up to the edge of the school campus, and I didn’t fear that anyone would spot us there. 

After about fifty feet, I turned by back to the trees and faced him, crossing my arms. 

He stood about three feet away with his hands in his pockets and a pleased look on his face. 

We waited a moment for the second bell to ring, sizing one another up. Once everyone had made it to their classes, only the soft quiet of the nearby forest could be heard around us.

“I think you were saying something before,” I began. 

He grinned cheekily. “Sorry. What I was trying to tell you was: I accept your terms.” 

I wished I could have casually asked,  _ What terms? _ but I still remembered our last conversation perfectly. I had demanded total honesty. 

And it had taken him an entire month to agree to that? 

Something hotter than anger, more potent than rage, filled me suddenly. My face flushed again, but not from embarrassment this time. I looked right at Edward. 

“I thought,” I said with effort, struggling to refrain from shouting, “that you had already made your decision.” 

“And I thought it best not to be impulsive,” he replied. “You made several good points, and I wanted you to know that I took them seriously.” 

My teeth ground together. “You fully intended to decline, didn’t you?” 

He looked into my eyes. “Yes.” 

Fine. I’d suspected as much. I tried to cool my head before asking my next question. “What changed your mind?”

Edward took his time considering his answer. “I tried doing the right thing by letting you live your life without my interference.” He sighed, dropping his head. “Alice said it wouldn’t work, but I had to give it a shot.”

Who was he talking about? Alice? 

He went on. “I think it would be easier if you weren’t right here beside me every day. But I also tried leaving—that didn’t work either.” 

“What would be easier?” I said angrily. 

“Ignoring you,” he said, as if this explained everything. 

But he had been ignoring me, and it hadn’t appeared difficult at all. “Do you want to ignore me?” I asked, half afraid of the answer. 

He paused, then softly said, “No. I don’t. I can’t. It’s horribly selfish of me, but my mind is made up.” 

“I don’t want you to ignore me, Edward. That’s not selfishness.” I refocused on the topic at hand. “Are you serious about being honest with me from now on?” 

“Of course,” he said. “Though I really wish you wouldn’t try to figure me out. Knowledge can be dangerous.” 

“I’ll take my chances,” I said. 

He just shook his head, looking agitated. “I swear, it’s not just that you  _ attract _ danger—you openly seek it out.” 

I supposed given last month’s near death experience and today’s eager acceptance of unknown risks, it appeared that way. But it didn’t matter if he was right, it was still rude of him to mention it, so I said, “No I don’t,” stuck my tongue out at him, and turned away toward the forest. 

Before I had even taken a step, there was a sudden whooshing noise in my ears and I felt the sensation of being yanked through space, like I was on a roller coaster. Then, with no warning or awareness of how it happened, my back was pressed up against the soft moss of a tree trunk and Edward was standing right in front of me, both hands planted firmly on the bark above my shoulders. 

I gasped involuntarily, my head spinning as it raced to make sense of what just happened. 

Edward’s eyes, inches from mine, were bright and a little wild. His lips were pulled back into the widest smile I’d ever seen, revealing perfect, gleaming white teeth. He looked like a little kid that had just been set loose for recess. He even laughed—the sound reminded me strangely of wind chimes. 

This was the closest he’d ever been to me—not just physically, but in all ways. This Edward wasn’t playing at being a normal human teenage boy. He was just...Edward. And he smelled really good.

Before I could properly decide how to react, he stepped away from me—only, it was more like six steps taken in the same amount of time as just one. 

“Well, I guess you’re done with pretending,” I said breathlessly, clinging to the tree in order to stay upright. 

“Sorry.” He did not sound sorry. “It’s not like you didn’t know about that part.” 

That was true. I knew about the super speed. He had raced across the parking lot to save me from Tyler’s minivan. But knowing and experiencing were two separate affairs. 

“Just...give me a little warning next time,” I gasped. 

He seemed to think that was hilarious, or maybe he was just feeling lighthearted. Either way, when he looked over at me with that carefree amusement on his face, my heart jumped wildly inside my chest and I lost that little ability to focus I’d had before. 

Then the bell rang, startling me and snapping reality back into place. “Crap, I have to get to my last class.” 

Edward’s boyish grin faded into a regular one as I secured my bag on my shoulder again—when had I dropped it?—and pushed off from the tree. He fell into step beside me as we walked back around the building and merged with the crowd. Before parting ways, I turned to look at him one more time. 

He was standing in the middle of the moving crowd, watching me and looking even more beautiful than I had thought he did the first time I saw him. The look in his eyes was unclouded now—it was also a little smug. 

I laughed as I turned away from him and hurried off. I’d have to see what I could do about that. 

  
  



	7. Chapter Six - Spring

I tried to give my final lesson all the effort that my other lessons had deserved, but even if my mind hadn’t been filled with shameless, sepia-toned, period-drama-esque replays of the last hour with Edward, Eric would have made it impossible. 

I had a sinking feeling I knew why he was beaming at me from across the room. Word sure did travel fast in this tiny school. I spent most of the lesson planning my escape route. 

As soon as the final bell rang, I bolted from the classroom. My keys were in my hand before I even made it out the door and my path was completely unobstructed as I half-jogged to the parking lot. I heard someone call out to me, but I pretended not to hear them. I was determined not to face any more of this today.

I almost succeeded.

But the Frankentruck refused to cooperate. I pushed the right key into the lock on the first try, but as soon as I tried to turn it, it jammed and I fumbled clumsily. 

My keys fell to the asphalt with a traitorous clink. 

Then Eric was upon me. 

“Hey, Bella!” he said. 

I sighed and faced the music, now ready to get this over with. 

“So, I heard that you weren’t going to ask Mike to the dance?” He asked brightly, even confidently. 

Annoyed, I bent to pick up my keys but as I straightened, I caught Edward walking across the parking lot. His smile was like a beacon light cutting right through my attempts to focus. But was he...laughing at me? I hated that I was so aware of him that I even noticed at all. 

I felt like scowling, but I worried Eric would misinterpret somehow. 

This situation required more finesse than the one with Mike had. Eric was sweet but a little delicate. Another girl would be lucky to have him as her date. I didn’t want to shatter him. 

“I’m not asking anyone, Eric,” I told him gently. 

His face fell a little, but he rallied once more. “Oh...well, would you say yes if someone asked you?” 

I schooled my face into an expression of regret and shook my head. “Sorry, Eric.”

At last, defeat took over. “It’s okay, Bella. Well, maybe next time?”

I turned and finally opened the door to my truck. “Maybe.” 

“Alright. Well, see you tomorrow.” Eric smiled once more at me before he turned and walked away.

My heart went out to him, but I couldn’t give him false hope. I climbed into the Frankentruck and revved her monstrous engine to life. 

Just as I shifted into gear, however, a familiar black SUV pulled to a halt directly in front of me and idled. I didn’t have to look to know Edward was driving, but of course I did. He had me blocked in. 

But why? 

The driver’s side window was down so I could see him. He looked pointedly toward me, and then his gaze shifted to my left.

A sudden knock on my window had me jumping out of my skin. When I looked over, Tyler was standing on the other side of the glass, watching me. There were still a few visible scars and scratches on his face and neck from the accident, but he had healed completely in the last month. 

I couldn’t imagine what he wanted, but then I saw his new vehicle in my rear view mirror and sighed. The windows in my truck were hand-crank only, so I only managed to get my window halfway down to talk to him. 

“Sorry, Tyler. Cullen has me blocked in,” I explained. 

“Oh, I know,” he said easily. “It’s fine. Actually, it gives me a chance to ask you something…”

I didn’t bother stifling my groan. I knew it wouldn’t even register with Tyler. 

“Will you go with me to the dance?” he flat out asked. 

“Tyler,” I said, his name sounding like a desperate plea. “I’m not going to the dance.” 

“Right, you’re not going with Mike or Eric,” he clarified unnecessarily. “But will you go with me?” 

“No.” I had to work not to shout it at him. 

“Why not?” he asked, his expression turning sour. 

“I don’t want to go to the spring dance.” What reason was he expecting? 

I thought—foolishly—that this statement would put an end to his stubbornness. 

“If this is about the accident—”

“I don’t care about the accident, Tyler!” Now I was shouting, but this was a different point of contention than the dance. I was sick of his remorse—he wasn’t even really trying to apologize anymore. I think he hoped that if I felt sorry for him, I’d break down and agree to a date. 

Well I hadn't yet and wasn’t going to. 

He sniffed a little, as if upset I had raised my voice, and then suddenly grinned as a whole new thought occurred to him. 

“It’s okay. We still have prom!” he said, and then dashed back to his car before I could even process what he said. 

As soon as I did, my face burned hotly with anger and I gripped the steering wheel, mentally picturing it as Edward’s throat. In front of me, his eyes trained on the road before him, Edward was shaking with laughter. 

This was his doing. 

I reached over to grab the door handle, determined to march over to him and...and do...something! Anything! It didn’t matter. I was too angry and embarrassed to form a plan—I’d just get over there and figure out the details afterwards. 

But before I could open my door, the other Cullens appeared around the SUV, and I couldn’t bring myself to involve them in my crime even as witnesses. 

I hadn’t studied them properly since that first day, but I remembered them. Nothing would burn their strange allure from my mind. The tallest one, the NFL player, opened one door for the heart-stopping blonde while the blond boy who seemed uncomfortable all the time opened another door for the shortest girl. 

I was staring at the shorter, dark-haired girl with the pixie-cut—in truth, I wasn’t so much staring as I was admiring—when she paused suddenly, turned in my direction, and smiled. 

I blinked, dazed, confused, and half-convinced she wasn’t smiling at  _ me _ , because this was not the kind of smile that strangers gave to one another when they passed in a grocery aisle, nor was it the bright, accusatory smile that someone might bestow upon a creeper who was openly watching them. Her smile was...comforting and warm. It was almost fond. It was the smile someone might give an old friend after not seeing them for a while. 

Confusion made my brain short-circuit, and I had to shake myself mentally in order to respond in some way. Hesitantly, uncertainly, I smiled back at her.

An even brighter expression of happiness bloomed on her face, and then she waved.

I waved back, feeling my eyebrows draw together and suddenly recalling with perfect clarity what Edward had told me a month ago:  _ Did you know that when you frown, you get this little dent between your eyebrows?  _ Automatically, my hand turned toward my face and, apparently watching me, Edward’s sister laughed. 

She was transformed when she laughed, but more than that, her joy triggered the strangest transformation in the blonde boy holding the door for her. He appeared infected by her happiness and, in an instant, lost the invisible chains of discomfort that had weighed him down. His growing smile as he stared at the girl was one of such powerful adoration that my throat tightened and I was forced to blink. 

As quickly as it had begun, it ended. Edward’s sister turned from me to him, and, gazing at one another, they slid into the car and closed the door. 

* * *

The scene haunted me my entire drive home and well after. I felt...odd. Empty. It was as if the girl and the boy had cast some spell on me and then broken it within the span of a few minutes. The loving way they gazed at each other replayed on a loop in my mind. I hadn’t thought it was possible for someone to change so much in an instant, but I also couldn’t shake the strange suspicion that the girl had meant for me to witness it. And I didn’t even know her name. 

I was in a daze as I walked into Charlie’s house and up the stairs. I was in a daze as I took out my books and looked at the titles, trying to remember what I needed for homework. I was in a daze as I wandered downstairs to raid the kitchen. Every time I remembered what I was doing, it would only last for a few minutes and then my concentration would slip from me again. 

My unfocused eyes were scanning refrigerator shelves when a sudden noise startled me back to the present. It took several seconds for my mind to adjust and for me to realize that my phone was ringing. 

I dug it out of my pocket—it was Jess. 

“Hey Jess,” I said, closing the refrigerator guiltily. Hopefully I hadn’t been doing that too long. 

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” She squealed. I leaned away from the earpiece to avoid damaging my eardrum. “Mike  _ finally  _ said he’d go with me to the dance.”

I chuckled. “Why are you thanking me? Clearly he remembered how amazing you are and realized he was being an idiot.” 

“Nah,” she brushed that notion off easily. “I mean yes, I am amazing, and he is an idiot, but you have no idea how smug he was after turning me down to wait for you to ask him. I told him you would tell him no, and he wouldn’t listen. Whatever you said though finally got him running back to me like a heartsick puppy.” She laughed again, full of mirth. A tinge of worry for Mike sprang up inside me, but I ignored it. Jess wouldn’t do anything too cruel. Mike would be fine, probably. 

“That’s great, Jess. Hey, we should go shop for dresses soon, somewhere outside of Forks.” 

She seemed thrilled. “Absolutely! Wait, so are you coming to the dance stag?” 

“I don’t like dances, but I do need a weekend out of town,” I replied. This was more than true. I needed a major distraction.

Charlie poked his head around the doorframe suddenly, looking at me. I hadn’t even heard him come home.

“You’re going out of town?” he asked, admitting to eavesdropping. 

I shrugged, but then nodded as I remembered another upcoming trip. “Hold on just a second, Jess—” I placed my hand over the receiver and addressed Charlie. “Jess and I might go shopping sometime soon, but actually this weekend a bunch of us are going to the beach down in La Push.” I didn’t ask for permission, but it would be rude to not inform him. 

He just nodded, seeming to take no issue with this plan, tugging on his belt. “Oh, alright. As long as you kids all stick together. Just let me know before you decide to travel somewhere too far away, like Seattle. I worry about some of the stuff I hear people say about that place.” He frowned, clearly worrying about that stuff as he spoke to me. 

I nodded with exaggerated solemnity. “Of course, dad.”

He grunted, and then walked away again. I managed to stifle a smile until he was out of sight, then returned to my conversation with Jessica. 

The next morning, I struggled to focus the closer I got to school. I didn’t even immediately start searching for Edward, I was so distracted. I parked where I usually did and hopped out of my truck in a fog, but this merely caused me to drop my keys in a mistaken attempt to turn the lock without concentrating on it. 

I was losing my keys a lot lately. Maybe it was time to buy a new keychain.

I sighed and bent to pick them up, but before my fingers could even brush against the metal, they vanished. 

With no warning, he was there. Today he had forgone all jackets and was simply wearing a light t-shirt and dark jeans.  _ Well, it is a little warmer. _ I blinked at his chest—which was entirely too close to my face to be socially acceptable, surely—before forcing myself to meet his eyes. 

They were amber again today. He grinned, oozing childish mischief. 

I sighed and held my hand out impatiently. “If I had known this was what you meant when you agreed to my terms, I might not have presented them quite so readily.”

Edward dropped my keys into my palm and leaned against the truck bed as he watched me lock it. “Tough. I warned you to be careful what you wish for.”

I rolled my eyes and started walking up to the school. He fell easily into step beside me. 

“What brings you to me this early in the morning?” I asked, recalling that the last time he had stood beside me in the parking lot, we’d been wedged between two vehicles for an hour and then sent to the hospital. 

“Can’t it be enough that I wanted to see you?” he asked, affecting a slight pout. 

“It could have been, before you made that face at me,” I informed him. The pout reminded me of Mike, which reminded me of Eric, which reminded me of Tyler, which reminded me that I was actually furious with Edward for his interference yesterday. 

He laughed, losing all resemblance to Mike or, really, to anyone, and answered my question. “Truth was a key condition. Actually, I walked over to ask you something.” 

Curious, I looked at him again. “Ask me what?” 

“Saturday, the day of the dance, do you—”

“Are you making fun of me?” I interrupted, halting and wheeling around to glare at him. 

He was amused by my reaction, but raised his hands in defense. “I’m not going to ask you to the dance. Your position on that is very clear. However, since almost everyone else will be going, I thought you might be free to spend the day with me.”

This was so unexpected that I had to take a minute for my mind to stop reeling before I could decide how to respond to him. His motives were definitely suspect, but I  _ wanted _ to spend more time with him. Was he seriously agreeing to what I hoped he was agreeing to? 

“What did you have in mind?” I asked hesitantly. 

He seemed pleased that I hadn’t said no yet. “A short hike. There are a lot of fun trails around here, and they’re a good excuse for us to talk some more.”

“There are plenty of dry, indoor places we can go if all you want to do is talk,” I reminded him.

He shook his head. “Not without other people, and I don’t trust myself. Every time I’m around you, I find myself doing things that I shouldn’t do around anyone.”

I couldn’t exactly argue that point, but I gave it a shot. “Then just...don’t show off.”

He laughed, exasperated. “I’m not showing off, Bella.” I was pretty sure he was showing off a little. “I forget where I am around you. You make me feel too...comfortable, like I can be myself.”

I felt myself starting to blush and turned to the side. “Oh.” 

“So what do you say?” he asked again, sounding less confident. 

Right. Hiking. I swallowed my nerves and nodded at him. “Alright.”

His face broke into a wide grin, and then the first bell rang, throwing me into a panic. I was always losing track of time with him. 

“I’ll see you at lunch,” he called after me as I hurried away, my heart pounding in my chest. 

* * *

I didn’t see him at lunch. It was exactly as it had been all last month—the other Cullens were sitting around their table, ignoring the world, but Edward wasn’t among them. My spirits, which had been high all morning, suddenly deflated. 

This acute disappointment had me frowning so much that even Angela noticed. After we got our food, she touched my arm and said, “Are you okay, Bella?”

I tried to smile at her, but didn’t feel successful. “I’m fine. I was supposed to talk to Edward at lunch today.”

Much to my surprise, she smirked amusedly, and said, “Oh, is that why he’s been staring at you this whole time?” 

Confused, I followed her gesture to a table on the other side of the room from the Cullens, where Edward was sitting and gazing evenly in my direction. When I finally saw him, he gave a slight wave. 

“Thanks,” I mumbled to Angela, embarrassed. “I’ll catch up with you guys later.” 

I felt like I was being watched by the entire school as I walked slowly to where Edward sat, but that was ridiculous. He was the only one who ever really stared at me, and surely I was used to that by now. 

He didn’t say anything as I sat down across from him, but I noticed there was no food on the table besides mine. I popped open my can of soda. 

“Are you not going to eat?” I asked.

“Not today,” he said.

Whatever. I shrugged and took a drink. “So...did your family kick you out?” 

He smiled. “Not exactly, though they aren’t happy with me at the moment.” 

That didn’t sound good. I hesitated, then quietly asked, “Because of me?” 

Edward appraised me, then sighed and leaned on his elbows. “Two of them believe I shouldn’t even be thinking about you and are angry that I agreed to your terms.” 

“And angry with me for demanding the truth in the first place, of course.”

“Essentially, yes,” he paused for a moment, chuckled as if in response to a private joke, and then went on. “The other two wish I would bring you over to their table already. They’re impatient to meet you. This was the best of both worlds.”

“So no one is happy,” I observed, toying with the tab on my soda can as I wondered which two were in my favor. “Except me.”

“Are you?” He looked at me intently. “Happy, I mean?”

“Of course I am,” I answered, surprised he even had to ask. Wasn’t it obvious? It seemed obvious to me.

“I haven’t given you much reason to be up to this point, and today I’ve taken you away from your friends.”

I rolled my eyes. “I mean, I’d gladly take you back to my table, but I think you’d give Mike a new complex and Jess wouldn’t be able to stop asking you questions.” I pointed at him. “No one is allowed to ask you questions until I’ve had mine answered first, alright?” He chuckled and nodded. My hands fell to the table again where I clasped them together. “Besides, I...like talking to you.” I did like talking to him, but I was also very attracted to him, which added significantly to my happiness. Some truths didn’t need to be voiced aloud, however.

“It’s difficult for me to express how deeply I enjoy your company,” Edward said softly. 

It was such an old-fashioned way of saying, “I like talking to you too,” that it made me giggle. He looked at me questioningly and I waved him off. 

Lunch passed quickly as we danced from topic to topic. I tried to pin him down on the matter of his “superpowers,” which was a word he vehemently disliked, causing me to use it more than I might have otherwise. He expertly evaded nearly every personal question I presented unless it was related to likes and dislikes, so we ended up there. As it turned out, we had similar tastes in music and literature, which I was surprised not to find odd. He spoke like someone who read Keats for fun, after all. We disagreed about Byron (I was sympathetic while Edward was condemning) but could have talked all day about the Brontë sisters. I was so absorbed in our conversation, leaning across the table, arguing and laughing, that the entire cafeteria had cleared out before I realized lunch was over. 

“Why does this keep—” I gasped, tossing my tray nearly in the trashcan and scooping up my bag. “C’mon, we’re going to be late!” 

“I’m ditching today,” he said, standing and clearly in no hurry. 

I gaped at him. “What do you mean, you’re ditching?”

“It’s healthy for you in moderation,” he said with a serious face. “Stay with me. We can sit in my car and listen to Debussy.” 

As tempting as that sounded, I shook my head. “I can’t keep ditching classes with you, Edward. I’ll see you later.” There was no time for me to make more definitive plans than that. I left the cafeteria and sprinted across the campus toward Biology. 

Relief flooded through me as I swung inside the door and saw that the teacher wasn’t even there yet—class hadn’t started. I rushed to my seat and fell into it as I focused on my heart rate and breathing. 

But my relief was short-lived, because as soon as the teacher walked into the room and I saw what he was carrying, my heart broke into a sprint and my face drained.

Today, we were blood typing. 

Our teacher started passing out cards and—much to my horror—small needles. 

Already the room was looking a little out of focus. 

Then, the demonstration started. He pulled the student in the first row to the front of the room and held up his pointer finger for everyone to see before pricking it quickly and—oh, no—squeezing. 

My stomach started doing backflips. 

I told myself I could handle it. After all, I’d managed to sit mere feet from Tyler while the doctor sewed through his skin and blood drenched his shirt. This was nothing compared to that. 

But I had been in shock then, and also not bleeding. Plus, no one had come at me with any needles. It was different when needles got involved. 

“Bella?” I heard someone say, but the voice was distant, as if I was hearing it underwater. I tried to turn toward the voice, but that made the room spin. 

I blinked slowly, and pressed a hand to my face. It was cold, clammy. This was very bad. I should have ditched with Edward. 

“Hey, I think she’s going to pass out!” I heard someone else yell, before the sound of loud footsteps grew closer. 

My vision swam as someone jostled me so much I started falling, and then without warning, everything went black. 

* * *

Light assaulted my eyes behind closed eyelids, but I was no longer underwater—or, it seemed, in Biology. I wasn’t actually quite sure where I was. 

I blinked, then squinted, at unfamiliar ceiling tiles and a wall with posters on it to my right. Below me was a hard canvas cot, but I had no memory of being led to it. 

A grunt escaped me as I tried to sit up, but someone pushed me back down again. 

“Not so fast,” they said, and the voice was...low, persuasive. Edward. 

Where had he come from? I tried to look at him, but he was little more than a tall dark shape leaning over me, so I reached out to him instead. 

“Ah, Bella,” he caught my wrist, clearly trying to prevent me from touching him, but I wasn’t having that and grabbed his hand with my other free one. 

Goosebumps broke out along my skin at the contact. It was smooth and shockingly cold—as if he had held it in ice water for the last half hour—but blessedly not clammy, as mine had become. At the moment, I was happy to find this was the case. 

I sighed, relaxing again. Surprise made his grip on my wrist slacken and I took advantage, encasing his frozen hand in both of mine. I would have pressed it to my cheek, but I wasn’t so far gone that I thought I could get away with it.

My eyes fell shut again. It was enough to have his hand in mine and feel the world righting itself a little more every moment. 

“Are you awake now, dear?” said a new voice—an older woman’s voice, from somewhere near my head. 

Edward immediately slipped his hand away, and I blinked my eyes open again, trying harder to focus now that I wasn’t quite so lost. This had to be the nurse’s office. 

She helped me sit up and brought me a small cup of water, fussing a little.

“I tried to warn him—this happens every year,” she was complaining about the Biology teacher now, walking away. I shook my head and focused on my breathing. 

Edward still had not explained his presence. I peered at him over the rim of my plastic cup. “I thought you were ditching.” 

His brow lowered and he put his finger over his lips in a  _ shh _ motion, glancing at the nurse who was not paying attention in the slightest. I rolled my eyes. 

“I should be, and so should you,” he said, assessing me. “But I saw Mike struggling to drag your lifeless form across campus and ran back quickly to avenge your murder.” 

“Then when you realized I was just unconscious, you stole my lifeless form from him?”

“Yes, and it wasn’t easy,” he complained. “Mike needs to learn when to give up.” I snorted, but made no comment on that, so he changed the subject. “Was it the blood?” 

I tilted my head a little, trying to figure out where to start. “Partly the blood, mostly the...needles.” I grimaced. “I don’t even like the mention of them.” 

“Childhood trauma?” he asked. 

I mimed shooting him with my thumb and forefinger. “Bingo.” 

He nodded and started to respond, but just as he did, the door opened again and two more students stumbled in. One was Mike. He was struggling to drag another unconscious male student into the office. I watched the nurse’s expression go from disapproval to concern as she rushed toward them. 

“Ah, Bella,” Edward said, stepping in front of me suddenly and blocking my view. “I think it’d be best if we left. Right now.” 

Frowning but not arguing, I let him lead me safely around a glaring Mike and out into the small hallway beside the main office. He quickly shut the door behind us. 

I scrunched my nose up. “More blood?”

“Significantly more than one would expect from a prick to the finger,” he clarified. 

“Don’t tell me any more than that,” I commanded, walking over to a plastic chair and dropping into it with a big sigh. 

Edward stood by the door for a minute, listening, before walking over to me. “Sounds like you’re not the only one who can't handle a needle. I’m inclined to dislike Mike, but at least he caught you before  _ that _ happened.”

“What? Did he add injury to insult?” I asked. 

“And hit his head on the corner of a desk on his way down.” 

I winced at the image that elicited. “Ouch.” 

We were quiet for a moment. I didn’t feel close to another fainting spell, but I was fairly drained. 

“So...this weekend a bunch of us are getting together and going down to the beach,” I said conversationally. 

“It should be a good weekend for that,” he responded just as casually. “Very sunny.”

The thought of potentially seeing the sun again had my heart soaring and I had to calm it down. “That’s what Jessica said. If you’d like...I mean, if you want to, you should come with us.” 

Edward hesitated, then said, “Which beach?”

“La Push,” I said, just as the door to the nurse’s office opened again and Mike stepped out. 

His gaze swung from me to Edward, and I could feel the animosity rolling off of him when Edward smiled tauntingly. He stepped closer to me. 

“Are you talking about the beach trip?” He asked me. “Does that mean you’re going?” 

I nodded, not thrilled when his face lit up with excitement. It was just as quickly dashed when I followed up with, “I was just inviting Edward.” 

Mike eyed Edward with contempt, clearly attempting to convey how unwelcome he was.

Edward frowned for just a second, but quickly recovered and smiled apologetically at me. “I’m afraid I can’t. My brothers and I are starting the weekend early and going camping around Rainier tomorrow. I won’t be back in time to join you.”

I hadn’t mentioned what time we were leaving, but that was clearly not the issue anyway. Damn Mike and his stupid possessiveness. 

I was disappointed, and let that be well known to the both of them. “Next time, then.” 

Mike snickered, clearly believing Edward had conceded to him, then said a quick goodbye and left for class. 

Once he was gone, I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the wall. 

“I don’t think I can manage gym.” I groaned. “Maybe Coach will let me sit out today.”

“I can get you out of gym,” Edward said. 

I lifted my head and turned to him, deathly serious. “That’s the sexiest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

He looked stunned for a minute, then simply shook his head, chuckling, and stood. “Wait here.”

I watched him leave the room and then listened through the open door as he used his lovely persuasive voice on the unsuspecting school secretary to acquire a pass for me for the rest of the school day. I knew she didn’t stand a chance. 

He brought the pass back to me in triumph, then whispered so that only I could hear, “Act sick—really milk it.” 

Oh dear. I was many things, but a convincing actor wasn’t one of them. I knew this about myself with absolute certainty. 

Nevertheless, I gave it my best effort, even going so far as to stumble so that Edward had to steady me as we passed the Secretary’s desk. 

He coughed, which sounded suspiciously like a coverup for a laugh. I knew this had to be highly entertaining for him to witness, but I glanced at his face anyway. He appeared to be barely holding it together as he took part in my pitiful performance. 

“Feel better soon, dear,” the secretary said with concern as we exited. I nodded weakly to her. 

Once we were out of her sight, Edward fell into a laughing fit that I managed to be slightly offended by, despite the infectious nature of his happiness. Eventually, he had to turn his face away from me because every time he saw my expression, it sent him into another round. 

“Shut up,” I snapped, walking away from him. “It was your idea.” 

He caught up to me and tried to look contrite, but it was no good. I was surprised he wasn’t flushed with tears after losing it like that. 

“I’ve never seen anything that bad...and what’s worse—it worked!” He tossed his head back, grinning at the sky. “You really milked it, huh?”

I stuck my tongue out at him. “It only worked because I’m so pale from fainting.”

“No, it worked because she saw me carrying you in there twenty minutes prior and it nearly gave her a heart attack. Unlike most people, she’s never been frightened of me before—that image will haunt her for a while,” he shook his head. 

I stopped and looked at him, tilting my head with confusion. “What do you mean?”

He was a few strides ahead and had to turn to face me. “What?”

“You said—” I hesitated. “She’s never been frightened of you before? Why would she be frightened?”

Edward’s expression of lighthearted amusement turned dour in an instant. He cursed swiftly and in a voice almost too low for me to hear, eyes averted. 

Something tickled in the back of my mind. He’d let something slip that he shouldn’t have...but what, exactly? His statements about the secretary were confusing, but replaying them in my mind didn’t immediately uncover their hidden meaning. I wasn’t in top form right now anyway. 

“Um, hey,” I said gently, walking up to him the way one might a frightened animal. “Forget I asked. My mom always tells me I’m too observant and it gets me in trouble. I can’t go back to class to get my keys until the bell rings, so why don’t we go sit in my car for a while?” This wasn’t true. I could get my keys now if I wanted, but I would have to either resurrect my terrible acting skills or ask Edward for a favor and neither option sounded appealing. 

What sounded most appealing was a few more minutes talking to him somewhere quiet and alone. 

Edward looked at me for a moment, then shook his head. “No, that won’t work.”

The rejection stung more than I would ever admit. It was a struggle to swallow and nod. I hugged my elbows. “Oh, uh, alright, then, I’ll just—”

“We can’t sit in your car. You don’t have your keys,” he said. “We’ll have to sit in mine.” He pulled his keys out of his pocket and grinned at me. 

I flushed immediately, going from ghostly white to fire engine red in the span of a few heartbeats. Miffed but unwilling to admit that I’d walked right into his trap, I cleared my throat and said, “Lead the way.”

His SUV was on the other side of the parking lot from my truck, but he walked beside me at my pace. 

I eyed him curiously. “Is this agonizingly slow for you?” 

“Sometimes. I’ve grown used to it.”

I nodded, but didn’t reply—he was holding the passenger’s side door open for me as if we were on a date and I had trouble thinking of anything else. I slid inside. 

The car was even nicer on the inside than I had presumed it to be from the outside. The seats were upholstered with creamy leather and everything shone like he had just driven it off the lot. I noticed almost immediately that it smelled like him and felt my face flush from embarrassment. Now was  _ not _ the time to be thinking about how nice he smelled.

He slid into the driver’s seat and started the car, adjusting the temperature dials and the volume on the stereo, which immediately started playing Clair deLune. I watched him in silence, completely absorbed with the slight flex of his arms and the way the fabric of his t-shirt stretched when he reached across the console. It was shameless, but I was more than willing to use lingering lightheadedness as an excuse if he caught me. 

“Are you comfortable?” he inquired, smiling slightly as he looked over at me. I couldn't tell by his expression if he’d caught me drooling. 

“Very,” I sighed, leaning against the headrest. “You have a nice car.”

“You should see my other one,” he chuckled. I couldn’t be entirely certain this was a joke, but I let it go. 

“No wonder you skip class so much. I would too if I had a spa waiting for me in the parking lot all day.”

“You probably won’t believe this, but I nearly never skipped class before you showed up,” he said. “I only consistently play hooky on sunny days, which, you might have noticed, are few and far between here.”

“I never skipped class in Phoenix,” I said. “My mother would often try to convince me to play hooky with her to shop or go for long weekend trips, but I was a stickler about attendance. It seems a little silly now…” 

He was quiet for a moment, then said, “Your mother sounds like a lot of fun.” 

I snorted. “She is, but growing up I learned to see her whims as...irresponsible. She’d get these crazy ideas in her head, and I’d be thrilled to go along with them until the other shoe dropped and we had no money and my teachers gave me failing grades and adults asked questions like, ‘Is everything alright at home?’ I think I’d be a lot more like her if I hadn’t had to be the parent so often.”

“Are you worried about her, in Jacksonville?” he asked. 

“No. Phil relieved me of my duties about a year ago.”

“And you have no problems with being usurped?”

I laughed. “Not anymore. He’s as young as she thinks she is, but he’s the right blend of spontaneous and grounded, and he loves her. He’s good for her in ways that I can’t be. I’m too much like Charlie.” 

“Ah yes, Chief Swan,” Edward said, appraising me. “I can see the resemblance.”

I hesitated before asking him a counter question. “What about your parents?”

I could see his walls trying to go up, but he faced me bravely and clarified, “Which ones?”

“Well,” I said cautiously. “I’ve met Dr. Cullen, your adoptive father. Tell me about your adoptive mother.”

He didn’t relax, but he didn’t grow any more tense either, which I took as a positive sign. “Esme.” A tender look fell upon his face. “I don’t know what kind of person I’d be if she was any less devoted to me. She has the gift of unconditional love. My choices...my past has hurt her and Carlisle, at times, but she has always welcomed me home no matter what. It’s the same with all my adoptive siblings. Carlisle follows her example.” 

“You’re very lucky,” I observed. 

He smiled, his face transformed by the love he clearly felt for his adoptive parents. “I know I am.”

“What happened to your birth parents?” I asked softly. 

He rubbed his jaw and looked away. “They both died...a very long time ago.”

“I’m sorry.” It was almost a whisper. 

He shook his head. “I rarely think of them. It's not painful anymore.”

I strongly suspected this was not the case, but I let it go. There was no need to cause him any more pain than my questions already had.

Distantly, I heard the school bell ringing, signaling the end of class. The sound was not a welcome one, as it put an end to my time with Edward. I sighed and smiled ruefully at him. 

“Thank you for saving me again. I think I’m losing track of what number we’re on,” I said, reaching for the door handle. 

“Wait—” he held up one finger, then, before I could open my mouth to ask why, he was opening the passenger’s side door for me again. “Thank you for allowing me to save you. It’s quickly becoming my new favorite hobby.” 

I laughed and rolled my eyes as I climbed out of the SUV. “How chivalrous of you.” 

“We aim to please,” he grinned. 

“Are you sure you can’t come to the beach on Saturday?” I asked again, not totally above begging. I knew it would be much more fun with him there. 

His smile faded quickly. “I’m beginning to regret my weekend plans.” 

That’s right—I wouldn’t see him tomorrow, or this weekend, or at all until Monday. I tried to cover up my disappointment with a quick shake of my head. “No, don’t say that—just, I don’t know, try not to get mauled by a bear out there, alright?” 

He seemed to think that notion was hilarious and tossed his head back as he laughed. “I assure you, the bear has more to fear from my brother than I do from it.” 

If he was talking about his brother the NFL player, I didn’t doubt that. I shrugged and started walking up to the school for my book bag and keys. “Whatever you say.” 

He didn’t follow, but called out from behind me, “How about this? I promise not to get eaten by any bears if you promise not to drown in the ocean.”

I paused and looked over my shoulder at him with a big grin. “Deal.”

  
  



	8. Chapter Seven - La Push

True to his word, Edward was nowhere to be seen at school on Friday, but neither were any of his siblings.

Angela smiled kindly at me during lunch—after my third glance in the direction of their empty table—before leaning over to whisper, “Dr. Cullen always pulls them out on warm days to go hiking and camping.” She glanced over at Mike to see if he was listening, but he was distracted by Jessica. “Honestly, their frequent trips practically keep the Newtons in business.” 

I thanked her for her explanation, embarrassed but relieved to know that the Cullens hadn’t all suddenly vanished for no apparent reason. It was warmer today. Not sunny, but comfortable and dry. Our trip to the beach might not be as dreary an affair as I feared. 

I appreciated Angela’s observant nature more as I got to know her better. Mike, Eric, and Tyler had been acting aloof around me since the day I turned all three of them down. Jessica had become somewhat absorbed in the strange game she was playing with Mike and Lauren still barely acknowledged my existence. 

It was difficult for me to pinpoint exactly how Angela had become friends with all of them, as different as she was in temperament. But despite her soft-spoken mannerisms and scholarly approach to things, she could be quite stubborn when provoked. Everything she said, she said with conviction. I was grateful for her steadfast presence and her complete disregard for gossip. When she asked me questions, she genuinely cared to learn the answers and never repeated them to the others. 

After my fainting spell, I was temporarily back to being a goldfish. Mike didn’t hesitate to repeat his first-hand account of the whole incident to anyone who asked, but I found it interesting that he never mentioned Edward’s involvement. It was as if he didn’t even remember Edward being there. 

During Spanish, Jessica did corner me to demand an explanation for yesterday’s lunch, however. 

“What did he even talk to you about?” she asked me. “He’s never not sat with his siblings—none of the Cullens have.”

“We didn’t really talk about much,” I hedged. “Mostly some Biology stuff. I invited him to come to La Push with us, but he couldn’t. That was about it.”

“Oh come on,” she rolled her eyes. “I could see you two flirting all the way across the room, Bella.”

I scoffed. “Have you ever tried to read him? Sure, we laughed a little, but I don’t think my flirting proficiency is  _ that _ good.” 

She seemed disappointed that I wouldn’t divulge more, but clearly believed that more existed. It was too difficult for her to pressure me in Spanish, however, and I was let off the hook about it for the time being. The rest of the day passed uneventfully.

That evening, I realized Charlie was more excited about my trip to La Push than I was. He told me everything he knew about the area while we made and ate dinner—I had been before, but I appreciated his fresh account. A large part of his excitement could be attributed to the fact that he trusted the people I was going with. He knew everyone by name and all their parents as well. In his eyes, the chances of me getting caught up in anything dangerous were slim, which made this outing perfect. I didn’t interject much while he poured information out about the people in town—it was rare to get him talking this much, and I wasn’t prepared to mention Edward yet, despite the fact that he was almost all I could think about lately. 

On Saturday, I awoke to see an unusual amount of light streaming in through my window. My first reaction was dread—how had the snow managed to find me again, and on today of all days? But my hazy consciousness cleared after a few moments, and I sprung out of bed and rushed to the window. 

Against all odds, the sun was there. My heart swelled with pure joy at the sight—I didn’t even care that it wasn’t the same sun I had known all my life. This sun was different, the light oddly filtered, but it transformed the green misty alien planet that was the Olympic Peninsula into a sprawling, lush garden. The clouds had been shoved to the edges of the world so that the lovely sun was surrounded by a halo of true blue sky. I could have stared at it all day. 

I drove to Mike’s family’s outdoor supplies store in a bubbly mood. As soon as I hopped out of my truck, I beamed at everyone, even Mike, and ran to hug Anglea. She was shocked and barely managed to keep us both from toppling over, but laughed when I apologized and blamed it on the sunshine. 

“Are you drunk?” Jessica asked me, shaking her head but bemused all the same. 

I shook out my hair and grinned at her. “I’m high on life. Sue me.” 

When it came time for us all to pile into the two off-road-capable vehicles, there were some logistics concerns. For one, Mike was being stubborn, trying to make me sit beside him in the front of his hatchback, but I declared my resolve to sit with Angela and weaseled my way into the third row with her and a boy from our class named Ben. Jess mouthed her thanks to me and took shotgun. Two more people than had been expected showed up, however, so Jess wound up sharing shotgun with Lauren which made both of them unhappy.

It was a little claustrophobic with nine people, and most of the supplies, packed inside like sardines, but the windows were rolled down the whole way and I was able to admire the incredible scenery along the roads and rivers snaking toward the coastline. I loved how untouched it all was and how the sunlight turned the murky green and mossy trees into towering emerald soldiers, protecting the land from the sea right up to the edge of the cliffs. 

I couldn’t believe how positive my mood was today. The sunlight really had turned me into a stranger. 

The waters of the pacific were a dark, stormy grey, even under the clear blue sky, and in the distance, dotted across their surface were rocky islands with tree-topped points which had been cleaved from the mainland long ago. Bone-white driftwood coming in on the tide was strewn about across the dark sand that met the water’s edge as well as the multihued pebbles which made up the rest of the beach. 

Mike parked back by the trees. The others had gone ahead and were busily constructing a conical driftwood bonfire in a ring of stones. As I followed Angela and Ben down toward it, a chilled briny breeze whipped off the water, blowing my hair back behind me. I burrowed into my coat. Even this bit of cold couldn’t bother me, with the sun still shining proudly in the sky above. 

By the time we made it down to the beach proper, a roaring fire was going strong. I blinked in surprise as I came upon it, seeing that it was not red-orange but rather blue. 

“Cool, huh? It’s all the salt in the wood.” Angela said. I looked over at her and nodded, seeing with some surprise that Ben was still on her other side and hadn’t gone to join the other boys now playing chicken with the frigid seawater. 

Much larger driftwood pieces had been situated in a rudimentary circle around the bonfire pit. We picked our way over to one and sat down to stay warm. Jess and Lauren were sitting on the one beside ours, chatting away about something that didn’t pique my interest, so I talked with Angela and Ben instead. Lauren still hadn’t warmed to me anyway, since Tyler was stubbornly refusing to accept that I didn’t intend to go to any dances with him, now or ever. I doubted I would ever endear myself to her. 

I was surprised to find how easy it was to talk to Ben. He had a calm demeanor and an easy laugh, which I noticed had brought out a more than slight interest in Angela’s eyes. She leaned toward him without seeming to realize it. They did most of the talking without me, but I didn’t mind. I was content to bask in the warmth of the blue fire and rare sun. So far, Mike and Eric and Tyler had left me alone. 

Today was shaping up wonderfully. 

After an hour or so, one of the couples announced they were breaking off to hike up to the tidal pools which started a chain reaction of other pairs deciding to go as well. Jess grabbed Mike, Lauren grabbed Tyler, and, much to her pleasure, Ben asked Angela. She asked if I wanted to join them, but though I loved the tidal pools, I assured her I wanted to stay behind. Ben seemed nice and I didn’t want to feel like a third wheel. 

About ten minutes after they walked off, I went to the car and dug out a tattered old compilation of Jane Austen novels to read, but never got the chance to. 

As I was approaching the bonfire again, I noticed several newcomers had arrived and were talking to the ten or so others who had stayed behind with me. All the newcomers had jet black hair and bronze skin, but appeared our age—teenagers from the reservation. 

Immediately, I recognized one of them from a distance and broke into a jog. “Jacob!” 

His face split into a wide grin as he turned and spotted me. I was out of breath when I finally reached him and skidded to a stop in the pebbles. He laughed and steadied me with a hand on my arm. 

“Careful, Bella.” Behind him were four other teenage boys he’d walked over with.

“Don’t tell me you came all this way just to see me,” he teased. 

“Of course,” I said with mock seriousness. “I also couldn’t say no to a beach trip on a sunny day. It’s good to see you, Jake.”

“It’s good to see you too, Bella.” 

“Why haven’t you and Billy been up to Forks in a while?”

He ran a hand through his hair. “Billy has been busy with the elders lately and I’m still working on my car.” I vaguely remembered him mentioning that to me the last time I’d seen him. “Hey, you haven’t caught anyone selling parts for a 1984 Volkswagen Rabbit recently, have you?” 

I pretended to wrack my brain, then laughed. “Not lately, but I’ll keep my eyes open.” 

One of the boys behind Jacob nudged him in the back, causing him to roll his eyes. “Right, okay,” he sighed, stepping to the side and gesturing to the others. “Bella, this is Paul, Embry, Quil, and Seth.”

I didn’t recognize any of them, but I didn’t see why I would have. They all had long dark hair and dark eyes like Jacob. Seth seemed to be the youngest, Paul the oldest, but I couldn’t be certain. I offered a friendly smile in greeting. Two of them, Paul and Embry, quickly returned to talking with my other classmates, but Seth and Quil hung beside Jacob and stared at me with big, secretive smiles on their faces. 

“So you’re the girl Jacob can’t stop talking about,” Quil said, causing Jacob to turn red in the face, his evident goal.

“Shut up, Quil,” Jacob ground out. 

“What? I was just letting her know we’d heard rumors of her beauty,” Quil snickered. 

I didn’t appreciate him trying to use me to make him uncomfortable. 

“Bella’s just my friend,” Jacob interrupted. 

“Yeah, and Jacob’s my dealer,” I added casually. 

Everyone stopped. Jacob looked at me with confusion while Quil and Seth both froze in shock.

“Car dealer,” I clarified innocently.

This extremely lame joke succeeded in making Jacob bark a laugh and breaking the strangely awkward air that hung between the four of us. I was pleased to see Quil’s face go from gloating to angry. 

“I warned you,” Seth said to Quil, laughing as he dodged Quil’s annoyed lunge in his direction. 

Jacob sent me a grateful look. 

Over Seth’s head, I could see the group that had hiked to the tide pools returning. Angela and Ben were looking chummier than they had when they left, I was pleased to note.

When Mike saw the Quileutes standing and talking to me, he made a beeline in my direction, despite Jess’s clear attempts to stop him. 

Jacob noticed my scowl. “Friends of yours?”

I made a noncommittal response and put on a neutral expression.

“Bella!” Mike said cheerfully, completely ignoring Jacob and his friends. “You should have come to see the pools with us. They’re incredible.”

Jess was a little out of breath when she finally caught up to him. Her eyes darted between me and the Quileutes curiously. 

“Jacob, this is Mike and Jessica,” I made the introductions. “Jess, Mike, this is Jacob, Quil, and Seth.” 

“You know Bella?” Mike asked them somewhat rudely. Jess glowered at him. 

“Oh yeah, Bella and I go way back,” Jacob said, grinning when this clearly agitated Mike. I tried not to look as amused as I felt by his goading. 

“C’mon Mike, you promised us all lunch,” Jess said, pushing him along toward the van against his will. She turned and smiled belatedly at the other three boys. “You’re all welcome to eat with us, if you like.” 

Mike’s expression contradicted her claim, but Quil and Seth either didn’t notice or didn’t care—they were eager to accept her offer of food. 

They started to follow, but paused to look back when Jacob didn’t move with them. “You coming, Jake?” 

He waved them off. “I want to talk to Bella for a moment, go on.” 

They hesitated for just a moment, then trailed after Mike and Jessica, who I noticed were now arguing. I laughed through my nose. 

“Sorry about...them,” Jacob said. His face was still a little pink. 

“Don’t worry about it,” I said, looking at him. “You wanted to talk about something?” 

“Yeah—” he paused, looking around at all the people near us. “Um, walk with me?” 

“Sure,” I said. We started off in the direction of the tide pools. 

The dense forest canopy hung over the hiking trail that wove across the cliff side toward the tide pools. I was sad that it obscured the sun and made everything feel slightly colder, but I knew we’d only be in the thick of it for a little while before reaching the other side. 

“First of all, I heard you got my truck involved in an accident,” he said.

“ _ I _ did not do  _ anything _ to  _ my _ truck,” I protested. “There’s not a scratch on her that wasn’t there before. If you still want someone to blame, talk to Tyler. The Frankentruck ate his minivan for breakfast.” 

Jacob laughed. “Woah, okay—sorry I insulted  _ your _ truck,” he said. “You are okay though?” 

“I’m fine,” I assured him. “It happened like a month ago.”

“Do you mind if I ask...a weird question?” He seemed very hesitant to broach this new subject. 

I studied him for a minute, but then nodded. “Of course not, Jake. You can ask me anything you like.”

“I really don’t want to ask,” he explained with a sigh. “It’s my dad—though I really don’t get why he cares at all. It’s none of our business.” 

This news was a little surprising. What could Billy want to know that he couldn’t ask Charlie? 

“It’s fine,” I assured him. “I don’t even know what you’re alluding to. I’m more than happy to answer your question if it helps Billy stop worrying.” 

He did look a little relieved as I said this. He took a deep breath and held up his hands. “Alright, but bear with me, like I said—it’s weird.”

“Spit it out, Jake,” I chuckled. Up ahead, I could see the break in the trees that signaled we were approaching the tidal pools.

“When the accident happened, with your truck,” he started hesitantly, “did...did a Cullen save you from being crushed?”

My heart stopped for two seconds, then started beating again too rapidly. I froze in complete shock on the trail, right at the edge of the forest’s shadows. 

Jacob stopped too, but just a second slower, putting him one step ahead of me, standing fully in the sunlight. His eyebrows were raised as he stared at me and waited for an answer. I suspected my reaction to his question was far from what he’d anticipated.

“Yes,” I said simply, not elaborating but studying Jake’s face in a whole new light. 

“Wait, really?” He was surprised and confused. “Dad wasn’t just repeating rumors?”

“Why does Billy want to know that, Jake?” I asked slowly, cautiously. 

He stuffed his hands into his pockets, seeming hesitant to explain. “Some stupid legends,” he muttered. 

I realized abruptly that I had to take charge of this situation, for two reasons. Billy was asking specifically about the Cullens, which meant he suspected—or knew—more than Jacob was letting on. I needed to convince Jacob to give me that information. This was the closest I might get to figuring out what was really going on. It was also important for me to convince him that suspecting the Cullens of any superhuman ability was silly, per the bargain I’d made with Edward. After all, he’d been holding up his end of it. 

Steeling my resolve—and hoping my terrible acting skills didn’t blow this for me—I marched out into the sunlight, chuckling with what I hoped sounded like doubt. “Your dad has  _ legends _ about the Cullens? Didn’t they just move to Forks two years ago?” 

Jacob smiled a little and followed me as I walked toward the tide pools. “It sounds ridiculous, but according to him and the elders, this isn’t the first time the Cullens have come to the area. Supposedly,” he paused, possibly for dramatic effect, “the Cullens came here back in my great-grandfather’s time.”

I glanced at Jacob dubiously before bending over to peer into one of the little microecosystems. “Okay, but that isn’t so weird—maybe it was just their ancestors, or different Cullens.” 

“It gets weirder when you hear that the legend also says the Cullens aren’t allowed to step foot on Quileute land.”

I straightened and turned to him, clearly much more interested now. Jacob grinned in triumph, slightly smug at having hooked me. 

“What do you mean, they aren’t allowed?” I asked. 

He arranged his smug face into a hesitant expression, turning away from me to look in a different pool. He was teasing me. “I’m  _ really _ not supposed to tell anyone the story outside the tribe…”

I walked over and tried to swat at him in annoyance, but he sidestepped out of my reach, laughing at my attempt. His footsteps faltered, however, and he nearly stumbled into a tidal pool before overcorrecting, which sent him careening into a nearby tree to regain his balance. 

I laughed and crossed my arms across my chest. “That’s what you get! Now spill.”

“Alright, alright,” he relented, righting himself and stalking back over to me. He ran a hand through his hair. “It’s a long story, though. You don’t get scared easy, right?” 

I found a large boulder and sat down on it’s edge, leveling a withering glare in his direction. 

He came and sat beside me, sighing. “If you’re sure…” 

“Just start at the beginning, Jake.” It was a struggle for me to refrain from demanding answers to the hundreds of questions swirling around in my brain. 

“How much do you know about our origins—Quileute origins, I mean?” 

“Next to nothing,” I admitted. 

“Well, there are a few stories. The tribal leaders pass them down from generation to generation. Some are more believable than others—all are ancient and sacred. My favorite one says that Quileutes are supposedly descended from wolves. That’s why it’s against tribal law to kill a wolf,” he chuckled. “If you listen to my dad, that one is also true. I mean, he really believes it—that ancient Quileutes turned into wolves. So did my mom, I’ve heard. I believed it too, of course, when I was younger.” He got lost in memory for a moment, then ran a hand through his hair and shook himself out of it. “Anyway, according to this same legend, the Quileute wolf-men have only one true enemy—” he leaned in closer to me, looking into my eyes to whisper “—the Cold Ones.”

A chill raced down my spine and I stilled, pressing my lips together. Jacob seemed pleased that his theatrics had successfully spooked me, and continued. 

“We have stories of the Cold Ones as ancient as the stories of the wolf-men, but other stories are not so ancient. My dad says that my great-grandfathers encountered the Cold Ones from our very oldest legends as recently as the 1930s.”

That was not ancient at all. “Your great-grandfathers?” I asked, confused. 

“I’m a descendant of the Blacks and the Atearas, which are both direct lines reaching all the way back to the first wolf-men. Quil and I share the same great-grandfather, actually—on my mother’s side.” He paused. “Supposedly, my great-grandfathers, Ephraim Black and Quil Ateara II, along with Levi Uley, inherited the ability to protect us from the Cold Ones. Only, they didn’t need to.”

“Why didn’t they need to?” I was fully engrossed now, and looked at Jacob earnestly, encouraging him to continue. 

He seemed slightly amused by my interest. “Well, this group that my great-grandfathers met posed no threat to the tribe or to the pale-faces. They claimed they were different from the others of their kind.”

“And your great-grandfathers believed them?” I said dubiously. 

“I know right?” he snorted. “But the Cold Ones outnumbered them five to three. If they’d wanted to kill us, it would have been fairly easy. Plus,” he hesitated before continuing with the next part, “Cold Ones reportedly possess superhuman strength and speed, equal to the wolf-men, but some possess...other abilities—real comic-book stuff, like mind reading. It was hardly a fair match. They were actually the ones to propose the treaty, not us. My great-grandfathers had no reason not to accept, even if their motives were suspect.” 

“What does the treaty specify?”

“Well...for one thing, that we won’t tell any pale-faces about the Cold Ones,” he eyed me ironically, “and they won’t tell anyone about the wolf-men. But, more importantly, that they aren’t allowed to kill any humans or trespass onto Quileute land. In return, they had their own hunting-grounds which we were forbidden from as well, at least until they left.” 

There was so much to absorb, but I could connect the dots. The Cold Ones were forbidden from crossing into Quileute lands. The Cullens were forbidden from coming to La Push. 

The Cullens were the Cold Ones.

“Jacob,” I began hesitantly. “What are the Cold Ones, really?” 

He grinned at me, pleased I’d asked, and dropped his voice again. “Blood-drinkers.”

_ Vampires. _ My brain supplied helpfully. Jacob was telling me that the Cullens were...vampires. 

Not just any vampires, either, but the same vampires who had forged a treaty with Jacob’s great-grandfathers in the 1930s. Almost a hundred years ago. 

It was impossible. Unfathomable. 

Deep down, somehow, I wasn't really surprised at all. 

I gazed off into the distance, across the tide pools to the place where the sky met the sea, letting this revelation warp and alter the reality I lived in. Nothing would be the same after this, I knew. I had already accepted some impossible things—incredible speed and strength, just to name a few. I should have felt afraid. 

Yet, fear never came. After all, those impossible things had saved my life. An impossible person had saved my life, and had risked quite a lot, it seemed, to do so. 

It occurred to me, distantly, that I was chilly.

“You have goosebumps,” Jacob remarked, teasing me and dragging me back to the present. 

“You sure know how to spin a story, Jacob,” I said, rubbing my arms. 

“I don’t tell it as well as my dad does,” he said modestly. Then he frowned. “Hey, uh, actually, if you don’t mind...don’t mention this story to anyone else, especially Charlie. It’s silly, I know, but my dad would be so mad if he found out I told you. He and Charlie got into a big fight back when Dr. Cullen started working at the hospital in Forks because a bunch of our people weren’t going to go there anymore. My dad wouldn’t even tell  _ him _ that story just to end the argument.” 

“You don’t have to worry about that, Jake. I swear, I won’t tell a soul.” I understood Billy’s stubborn secrecy more than Jacob did. Of course, I was also bound by an agreement I made with a Cullen. 

He seemed relieved. “Thanks.” 

I summoned my acting skills again and smiled at him. “No, thank you...for telling me, even though it's against the rules.” It was impossible for me to fully express the debt of gratitude I now owed Jacob. 

He returned my smile and started to say something more, but the sound of someone approaching on the trail had us both turning to peer into the trees. 

“There you are!” Mike shouted, a little too loud. He was approaching rather quickly, despite the uneven ground. Jessica was behind him, looking thoroughly annoyed. 

I sighed, mentally preparing myself to deal with him. Jacob eyed Mike with obvious derision. Our time was clearly up. 

“Well,” I said to Jacob. “Don’t be a stranger. Treaty or not, you and Billy are always welcome to visit.”

He grinned at me. “Be careful what you offer. Once I finish the Rabbit, I’ll be a free man.”

I raised one eyebrow at him. “Don’t you still need a permit?” 

His expression immediately turned sour, which made me laugh. 

Mike managed to arrive at exactly that moment. Jessica had been left in the dust—metaphorically. Was Mike truly ignorant? I frowned at him, but he didn’t notice. 

“Hey, we’re, uh, packing up to leave. Are you finished?” His eyes darted between me and Jacob, apparently assessing our level of closeness, which wasn’t any of his business. 

“Okay,” I said, hedging my answer. I could have talked to Jacob for much longer, but the sun was nearly gone and the clouds were moving in and I didn’t want Charlie to have to drive down and collect me. 

Jacob and I stood at the same time, and I realized suddenly—with smug pride—that Jacob was the slightly taller of the two. This threw Mike off considerably. I suspected he had written Jacob off as a threat on account of his age. I had no romantic interest in Jacob whatsoever, but I was more than willing to let Mike feel threatened by him if it kept him at bay. 

“Let’s go,” I said to Mike, annoyance evident in my tone. He was blocking our path to the trail. 

As soon as he turned and walked back toward Jessica, I started to follow at a slightly slower pace. Jacob walked beside me, his hands in his pockets. 

“I’m sorry again,” he apologized. 

“For what?” I asked him, confused. 

“For the weird question from my dad. I can’t believe that he really believes all that stuff about the Cullens. And if one of them kept you from being seriously injured or killed...well, that’s even less grounds for suspicion, isn’t it?” He had a hopeful gleam in his eyes as he looked at me. This went deeper than Jacob let on—it was almost like he wanted me to call him crazy, like he was afraid to believe. 

“It’s alright,” I tried to reassure him. “There’s probably a good explanation. I barely know the Cullens—I only talk to Edward because he did pull me out of the way.” This last part was a lie, which I hated, but it was the only thing I could think to say that might make Billy worry less. 

Jacob looked relieved. “Yeah? Well, thanks.” 

We walked on and met back up with the others. Jacob’s friends were evidently impatient for his return and started taunting him immediately, which had him blushing. I didn’t get another chance to speak with him after that, but I waved goodbye as I helped my classmates carry some things back up to the cars. 

Our seating arrangements remained the same, and I was grateful. Angela talked to Ben the whole way back, so I didn’t feel guilty for getting absorbed in my thoughts and tuning them out. 

Outside, the sun was gone completely and the world looked so much darker than before it had arrived. Forks would never seem the same to me now. A light drizzle began as we left the reservation, but it was a rather frightening storm by the time we entered town. I was grateful for it, in the end—everyone’s goodbyes were short as we all tried to rush back to our cars without getting soaked. 

I climbed into my truck and blasted the heater, laying my head on the steering wheel as my windows fogged up. There were so many thoughts racing through my mind that I didn’t want to think anymore. All I craved in this moment was a dreamless sleep. 

_ Yeah, right, _ I thought.  _ You can definitely kiss those goodbye.  _


	9. Chapter Eight - Port Angeles

The pieces fell all too perfectly into place, and yet still I struggled. 

It was difficult to wrap my head around. There was no guidebook for finding out that someone you liked might be a creature of myth and legend. Even my books couldn't help me here. Dracula hadn’t enrolled in high school, as far as I was aware. 

Charlie, blessedly, didn’t notice my complete and total distraction. There was a basketball game he was engrossed in. I mumbled an excuse about being tired and went straight upstairs after arriving at home. I wasn’t even hungry, despite not eating since early that morning. My stomach was in knots. 

I mulled Jacob’s story over and over in my mind as I took a shower and got ready for bed, but by then I still had achieved nothing and, on top of it, I couldn’t sleep. In the solitude of my room, I sat up on my bed with wet hair and fought with my mind in an effort to organize my thoughts. 

It was starting to give me a headache.

The simplest path would have been to just accept it. This option appealed to me—Edward had moved with inhuman speed and stopped moving vehicles before my very eyes, and I had accepted  _ those _ things just fine. 

So I examined the evidence from a purely objective vantage point, like a journalist, and tried to draw solid connections. 

The Quileutes called his kind the Cold Ones, and I knew from personal experience that he was cold—the shocking temperature of his hand, which I had held in the nurse’s office, cemented that connection. To add credence, I was also aware of how much effort he put into not letting anyone touch him. The Cold Ones couldn’t afford the risk of someone remembering how icy their skin was in a part of the world where people still knew of their existence. Even Dr. Cullen hadn't really touched me that day in the hospital—my hair didn’t register temperature. I doubted anyone would really think much of a Doctor having cold hands, anyway. He probably wore gloves all the time. 

But thinking about Dr. Cullen brought up a new issue—blood. If they were “blood-drinkers,” as Jacob had artfully put it, then how did Dr. Cullen manage to work every day in the presence of bleeding people? Was he secretly feeding off of them? It was possible, but...I felt ridiculous even entertaining the notion. Plus, Jacob had said these vampires were different and didn’t hurt humans. They must have truly found some way not to feed on them, or the Quileutes would have considered the treaty null and void.

Something else bothered me about using the term “vampires,” however: sunlight. I wasn’t naturally drawn to the gothic and the macabre, but even I knew that a key element in vampire lore was an aversion to sunlight, and the Cullens walked around outside just fine during the day. 

There again, though, I realized this wasn’t quite true. It was almost never sunny in Forks, and the one day it was...the Cullens disappeared. Angela had even told me this much, saying that they all ditched school on sunny days to hike and camp. I wondered how much of an excuse that was. I doubted it burned them, cold as they were, but they must’ve been avoiding direct sunlight for some good reason. 

Maybe they melted like the Wicked Witch of the West. 

Another discrepancy was that in Jacob’s story, there were five Cold Ones who proposed the treaty with his great-grandfathers, but the Cullens numbered seven. Such an argument was fruitless, though. It wasn’t out of the question that two of them hadn’t been present the first time around. 

I was really running out of reasons not to accept my hypothesis. 

It was somewhat comforting to know, however, that if I accepted all of this I wouldn’t be alone. Jacob didn’t believe the legends, but Billy obviously did, and I suspected he wasn’t the only one. The Quileutes had a long memory which had served them well, and the fact that they were adhering to this treaty after over half a century, even though almost no one took the legends for histories, proved how serious they were. 

They weren’t taking any chances with the Cullens. 

_ Maybe I should be following their example. _

I sighed heavily and flopped back onto my bed, tossing my arm over my eyes. 

Edward had warned me to stay away—with his words, at least—but he had been unable to stay away from me himself. 

He had told me, point blank, that it was dangerous for me to know too much, but he had also agreed not to lie to me and to not deny any truths I uncovered.

Despite his assurances, I couldn't go to him with what I had yet. I still had doubts and questions, and I couldn’t be certain he would react well if I was right. 

But at the same time, I couldn’t go to anyone else. I couldn’t even vaguely ask Charlie for rumors about the Cullens because doing so might put him in danger too. This hypothesis, if I fully accepted it, would have to remain my own personal secret, no matter what it cost me. 

It was fortunate, I supposed, that I’d already agreed to secrecy with Edward. That decision had been made, and I was at peace with it. 

Thinking about Edward brought his face to the forefront of my mind. I could picture him so clearly—sitting beside me in Biology, leaning over me on the icy asphalt, glaring at me in a hospital corridor, pressing me up against a mossy tree behind the school. 

One image led to another in an endless cycle, and memory merged with fantasy until after a while, I couldn’t separate the two. I could see him leaning over me again, just as he had that day after saving my life, but this time, rather than examining my head for blood, his lips were pressing gently against the hollow of my throat, and we were far removed from anyone or anything, lying somewhere soft and quiet. 

Slowly, deliberately, I reached around to press my hands against the nape of his neck. His skin was cold, so cold, but I didn’t mind at all—I relished it. My fingers traveled up to entwine with his hair. 

His cold cheek brushed against mine as he lifted his head to stare into my eyes. They were black now, with no gold to be seen.

I gasped once, but I knew what was coming and it didn’t frighten me. His lips peeled back to reveal sharp, gleaming white teeth, and then, without a sound, he lunged forward to sink them into my throat. 

I bolted upright with a gasp. I didn’t even realize I had fallen asleep until the dream startled me awake. I clutched my chest, my heart pounding desperately as though trying to escape. 

_ It was a dream. It was a dream. _ I repeated this mantra over and over in my head until I believed it. 

It appeared that even if my rational mind refused to accept the fact that Edward might be a vampire, my subconscious was already fully on board. 

I picked up the first paperback book my hand could reach and started fanning myself with it, unbearably hot all of the sudden. 

Oh yeah, I was definitely doomed. 

* * *

Sunday was easy, and there was one primary reason for this: I had decided I didn’t care. 

This conclusion had been drawn in the early hours of the morning after much more deliberation. At some point, I had been forced to admit it was driving me crazy and I couldn’t function like that. 

The simple fact of the matter was this: either Edward was a vampire or he wasn’t. He had to be something— _ average human _ was out of the realm of possibility at this point—but I simply didn’t have enough evidence to force the label of “vampire” on him. 

He was one of the Quileute’s Cold Ones, probably, but that didn’t automatically make him an immortal, blood-drinking creature of the night. The Quileutes might have misinterpreted details over time. There were things I couldn’t accept without first hand observation. 

I couldn’t exactly observe immortality though, so that wasn’t even worth mulling over. Although, Edward’s antiquated name and manner of speech had often caught me off guard. That was a problem.

And it wasn’t as though he’d just let me watch him drink someone’s blood, would he? Of course, I’d never seen him eat anything else either. That was another problem. 

But I didn’t care! I was tired of asking myself questions I didn’t have the answers to. I couldn’t let it ruin my day—especially such a nice, warm, sunny one. 

Yesterday’s storm clouds had fled sometime in the night and the sun was gracing us with its presence once more. I was thrilled that Charlie was going to be out of the house fishing—I was looking forward to basking in the sun in the backyard all day long. 

I managed to get quite a lot of work done while attempting to distract myself from thinking about Edward. I finished all my homework and my Lit paper on Macbeth that wasn’t due until Wednesday. The sun had dropped behind the treeline by the time I finished, so I went inside and cleaned the whole house and did all my laundry. I was just finishing dinner when Charlie walked in. 

He followed his nose to the kitchen, then smiled when he saw me. “You could’ve waited for me, Bells. I would’ve helped.”

“I know, but I was bored and figured it would save time,” I smiled back at him. 

During dinner, I remembered something I needed to tell Charlie about. 

“Oh by the way, dad,” I said carefully. “On Tuesday, I’m going down to Port Angeles with Jess and Angela to shop for dresses.”

He looked up at me. I was glad I’d asked him while we were eating—he could only partially focus on my plans. “Jessica Stanley?” 

I nodded. “And Angela Weber.” Once again, he was primarily concerned with who would be chaperoning me. I tried not to roll my eyes. 

“Are you going to the dance after all?” He looked hopeful. 

“No,” I said, hating to disappoint him. “But I want to shop with Jess and Angela. It’ll just be a girls night out, that’s all.” 

His brow lowered. “Tuesday...that’s a school night.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll leave right after school and be back before it gets too late. I just wanted to let you know because we’re planning to eat dinner in Port Angeles.” 

He grunted, and I suppressed a smile as he returned all his focus to his meal. 

I woke up to the same lovely sunshine Monday morning and my mood maintained its steady high. If Mother Nature wasn’t careful, I’d get used to this. 

The mood bonus was fortunate for me, because as I drove to school, I worried Edward wouldn’t be there again. He had only mentioned being absent on Friday, but everything had changed since Friday. 

The sun was out. Would all the Cullens be gone? 

This question was answered immediately upon my arrival to the school parking lot. The shiny black SUV was nowhere to be seen, and I was running late. 

I was disappointed, but more than anything, their absence made it difficult for me to dismiss my suspicions about what they were. I spent the entire day trying not to think about it, but was glad I had finished so much of my work the day before because that proved impossible. 

In Biology, our teacher declared that we were wasting precious sunshine and decided to have class outside, which resulted in the hour devolving into a free study period. I took out my books and pretended to read, but I was zoning out, doodling on the edge of my notes, and soaking in the warmth of the sun. 

As could be expected, Mike walked over to sit beside me. Irritation rose and then fell as he smiled at me. I was too content to be as mad at him as I wanted to be without a reason. 

Immediately, however, he gave me one. 

“Hey, Bella,” he started. I glanced at him. “So, is it true?” 

“Is what true, Mike?” 

His nose twitched. “Are you really going to prom with Tyler?” 

I froze, and then immediately turned on him in anger and snapped my book shut forcefully. “Excuse me,  _ what _ ?”

He leaned away from me a little, eyes wide. “Tyler is telling everyone that you’re going to prom with him, but Jess and Angela keep saying that’s a lie, so no one knows what to believe.” 

I made a rough growl of frustration and rubbed my face with my hands. “I swear, I am going to run him over with my truck!”

“So, it's not true then?” Mike asked cheerfully. 

“Of course not,” I said, exasperated. “I never agreed to go to prom with him, or with anyone.”

“Oh okay, cool,” he said. “So, will you go with me?”

“No!” I shouted. Several other students turned their heads at the sound, but I didn’t care. I was sick and tired of this. “Mike! Are you truly blind? Do you not see that Jess is interested in you?” I didn’t mention that her motives were suspect, but at this point, I hoped she taught him a lesson. “Are you seriously asking me to prom  _ before _ you’ve even gone to the spring dance with her? How do you think she will take that?” 

“But I want  _ you _ ,” he said stubbornly. 

“I’m not going to apologize for the way I feel,” I declared. “Please give up, Mike. For all our sakes.” 

He was caught off guard, either by my lengthy speech or my vehemence. A part of me was annoyed simply because these boys and these dances didn’t matter. It felt cliche, but the truth was that I felt above this high school drama. I was worried that real, blood-drinking monsters might be walking around Forks, but Mike only cared about one-upping his friends and showing me off like a shiny trophy. 

He sulked the rest of Biology and I stormed off to the gym in a huff, knowing I’d have to ignore him there too.

On Tuesday morning, when I awoke to see the sun still shining brightly, I immediately steeled myself for the crush of disappointment that would follow, deciding to let it pass and move on. I drove to school, determined to think of Edward no more and focus instead on my trip to Port Angeles that afternoon. I was excited to be finally getting out of town, and to somewhere with shops and restaurants. 

Mike did worry me a little. It was possible I’d been too harsh with him yesterday, but I was willing to apologize as soon as he finally accepted my refusal of his advances. 

I shouldn't have worried about Mike. He was still sulking—Jess was thrilled—but my new mortal enemy was Tyler. 

True to form, Tyler refused to listen to me when I told him in no uncertain terms that I was not going to prom with him. 

“You’ll change your mind,” he said with an easy smile before quickly running away.

I stood there in my rage, rapidly debating the pros and cons of running over and slapping him across the face, but ultimately decided he was so stupid, even that wouldn’t convince him of my rejection. No, my original plan of running him over with my truck was still my best option. 

Unless I could convince Edward to eat him. That idea had merit. 

Angela and Jess tried to help, but Jess also had to fight with Lauren on my behalf. Lauren hated me for taking Tyler’s attention from her—I didn’t even  _ want _ Tyler’s attention—and was almost as stubborn as he was in her refusal to believe me when I told her it was absolutely never going to happen. 

She wouldn’t be coming with us to Port Angeles, thank goodness. 

The day dragged on, but it had to end eventually. Jessica followed me home in her car so that I could drop my books and truck off at the house before we drove across town to collect Angela, who was waiting eagerly for us. 

I dumped all my silly worries and stress over high school drama right on the town line as we drove past the  _ Welcome to Forks _ sign. Mike and Tyler and even Edward and the Cullens would not be allowed to ruin this much-needed break for me. I’d worn my favorite sapphire-toned peasant blouse and arranged my wild curls into a half-updo and I felt really free for the first time since coming to Forks. 

Angela turned up a pop radio station way too loud so we could all sing along, but we got so sidetracked complaining about boys for the stress-relief high that we didn’t even realize we were having to shout over the music to hear each other until we were halfway there. I found myself laughing along with Angela at our inability to stop complaining, but that was as much needed as the dresses were.

Jess drove a little too fast, but that just meant we got to our destination in under an hour. I was mesmerized as I gazed out the window at the beautiful little bayside town. It was clearly designed to attract visitors with it’s aesthetically pleasing shops and quaint restaurants. I only got to glimpse the bay for a few minutes, however, before Jess turned down a different street and parked outside our target destination: a dress shop. 

As much as I enjoyed shopping, dresses were not my area of expertise. Still, I tried to offer genuine opinions on cut and color. Jess was annoyed that I had no experience with dances from my time in Phoenix. 

“But they must have been so much cooler than ours!” she exclaimed, trying to zip up a black satin a-line on her own. “What a wasted opportunity.” 

I shrugged, looking up at her from my seat on the floor. “I didn’t date that much and no one ever explicitly asked me.” 

“Well plenty of people ask you here,” she said, examining the dress she had on in the three-way mirror. “Even though it’s a girls’-choice dance,” she muttered. 

I shook my head. “You know I don’t feel that way about any of the guys. I’d rather never go to prom than go with Tyler.” The idea had me shuddering. 

“What about Eric?” Jess asked, studying me. 

“Eric is sweet...but I have no interest in him beyond thinking that. It would be wrong of me to get his hopes up.” 

“What about Edward?” Angela asked, leaning out of her dressing room to smile knowingly at me. 

Edward? Immediately, I blushed and looked away. Jess and Angela both hooked their claws into my reaction and teased me relentlessly about it the rest of the time we were there. I maintained my silence, but my expressions betrayed me at every turn. 

“Alright, let’s go look at shoes,” Angela said about an hour later, emerging from her dressing room with a lovely pale pink dress slung over one arm. 

Jess surfaced next. She had chosen a dark blue halter that really brought out her eyes. 

I dusted my pants off as I stood, following them back to the main part of the store.

“Actually, hm…” I hesitated, forming a new plan. “Do you guys mind if I ditch you? It’s already getting late and I want to go to this bookstore I looked up online.” 

“Do you know where you’re going?” Jess asked me seriously. 

“Sure, I’ve got my phone. Why don’t we meet up at the restaurant in an hour?” I was excited about eating at the place Jess and Angela had picked out since it was by the boardwalk. 

They both seemed hesitant to let me run off alone, but they still had things they needed and no desire to shop for books with me. After more discussion, however, they relented. 

“Call us when you head toward the restaurant, alright?” Angela told me. 

I agreed easily, and then we parted ways. 

Luckily, the used bookstore was easy to find, and it was just as welcoming in person as it had looked on the Internet. I smiled at the cashier when I stepped inside and then quickly got lost among the shelves. Rows and rows of beat-up paperbacks greeted me like old friends. I skimmed them, looking for things I hadn’t read yet among the fiction section and picking up anything that caught my eye. Who knew when I’d get the chance to shop for books again? 

This store also had an entire section devoted to local interests. There were huge books of photographs taken in Olympic National Park as well as collections of historical accounts from surrounding communities. I found a couple of books on the founding of Forks, but didn’t pause on them for long. My eye quickly snagged on a book about the Quileute Tribe. There was only the one, but I picked it up and purchased it impulsively. 

I spent the entire hour in the bookstore and then swore when I finally looked at the time. I hastily checked out, thanking the cashier and rushing out of the store into the twilight. I walked briskly down the sidewalk, barely paying attention to my direction as I dug into my bag for my phone to call Angela. 

That was my first mistake. I didn’t know the area at all—I should have had my phone out before I left, my GPS pointing me in the right direction while I spoke with Angela. I should have been looking where I walked and noticed that it was not a main road—that the streets were dark and no one was around because it was a Tuesday. 

Before I could find my phone, a large dark figure stepped out of the shadow of an alleyway and stood directly in my path.

“Nice night, isn’t it?” he said. 

I froze, which was the second stupidest thing I could have done. He was a hulking mass of imposing darkness and his smile made my stomach drop. 

I didn’t answer. Instead I shook myself out of my shock and quickly walked around him without making eye contact. All of my senses were suddenly working overtime. I finally located my phone. 

But the man didn’t let me walk far. He suddenly grabbed my arm in a strong grip, causing me to stumble and my fingers to lose my phone to the depths of my bag again. 

I inhaled sharply and pulled away, but it was useless.

_ Run, run, run!  _ my mind shouted to my feet, but I couldn’t get free of his hand. 

I heard him laugh, and his voice was joined by others who were now emerging from the shadows behind him. My eyes darted around, fear making me take in every detail. One of them leaned too far and had to right himself. They were probably all drunk. 

My heart was pounding and my mind was racing. I jerked my arm harder, but that only caused me more pain. The man who had a hold of me was monstrously large. 

“Just where do you think you’re going, sugar?” he taunted. “You can tell us. Maybe we can help you get there.” As he said the last line, he leaned in close to my ear and I could feel his hot breath on my face. It was foul. 

“Let go of me,” I demanded. Futilely I struggled against his grip, but, much to my dread, the others were surrounding us and I was losing sight of the rest of the street. 

“Aw, don’t be like that,” the man said.

The others were all laughing and making rude noises and gestures now.  _ Bad, bad, very bad, this is bad! _ I was panicking. I knew better but I was still panicking. I was supposed to fight back, run, scream, do something, but I couldn’t think around the furious beating of my heart. No plan of action came to mind as I felt myself being ushered against my will toward the dark alleyway. 

I thought I might puke. Surely this was not how I was supposed to die. 

Then, out of the darkness, headlights as bright as the noonday sun suddenly swung around a corner and flashed directly toward us, growing closer and closer until the two front tires of their vehicle jumped the edge of the sidewalk and came to a screeching halt mere inches from two of the drunkards that surrounded me. They reacted too slowly and fell to the ground in delayed shock. 

The brightness blinded me, but I squinted toward it anyway. I was desperate—ready to beg if whoever it was would get this man off me. 

Before I could open my mouth, I heard the driver’s door open and then a strange but familiar whooshing sound closed around my ears. There was no time for me to register what was happening. 

Without warning, my assailant shouted in pain and his hand vanished from my arm. 

In the next second, I found myself on the other side of the headlights, my eyes struggling to adjust as my rescuer propped me up against his car.

“Get in,” he commanded, and was gone before I could respond. 

“Edward?” I gasped when my brain finally registered through the shock that it was him. My eyes sought him out, but he had disappeared into thin air. Reluctantly, I turned back in the direction of the other men. 

Edward was standing exactly where I had been seconds ago, but far from being restrained, he had the large man by the throat and had lifted him completely off the ground with one hand. The man’s legs were kicking, as he struggled to get free and a strangled sort of sound was coming from his throat. 

The others around them were scrambling, struggling to react fast enough—some were yelling and running, but others were pulling out knives and closing in. 

Panic gripped me again. My eyes couldn’t accept what I was seeing as quickly as I was seeing it. 

“Edward!” I screamed, trying to warn him that the others were behind him. 

His face twitched in my direction, the movement too rapid to track, as if he had forgotten I was there. 

With the same level of ease as throwing trash into a dumpster, he tossed the large man into the alley—where there could be heard a sickening, crunching sound—and turned on his less cowardly comrades. 

This Edward was different than all those that had come before. This Edward looked every inch the villain from Jacob’s legends. I could see his white teeth bared and gleaming, his pale skin glowing in the light of the headlights. He was in near-constant motion as he easily flicked the small metal blades out of the hands of the other men and knocked them almost carelessly into the wall. 

Those who hadn’t attacked yet saw this and fled immediately, as quickly as their feet could take them. 

Edward turned toward their retreating forms and watched them with narrowed eyes until they were completely out of sight, lost into the shadows of the dark street. 

The silence that followed in their wake was strangely deafening. Even after they had disappeared, it was some moments before Edward was willing to look at me. 

I had no idea how I appeared in that moment. Physically, I was fine, if a little disheveled. Mentally? There were too many emotions swirling around inside me—surprise, worry, anger, relief...vindication. I hadn’t completely lost the urge to vomit, but I knew that was just the shock and fought it back. 

But I looked at him, and I was not afraid. I was not afraid of him, nor was I afraid those men would get revenge and find some way to hurt us. I was firm in my belief that Edward would protect me. Edward couldn’t be hurt by human men, and they couldn’t get to me unless they went through him. 

Without warning, he rushed to me, little more than a blur, and quickly ushered me into the car before climbing into the driver’s seat. Far from protesting, I fumbled for my seatbelt, ready to be rid of this place. No words were exchanged as he threw the car into gear, backed off the curb onto the road, and drove off. 

I was a little dazed, but still had enough wherewithal to recognize that this was not his black SUV. This was much nicer with a dark leather interior and dim lighting that nearly obscured his face from me completely. 

He drove—very quickly, it felt, though I couldn’t trust my proprioception in that moment—and I stared ahead out the windshield, trying to get my bearings. 

I wished my heart would calm, but it was in a race with my brain. Adrenaline continued to course through me no matter how many times I repeated to myself that I was fine, I was okay, I was safe, and Edward was with me.

The problem was, I couldn’t promise myself that  _ Edward _ was safe. Though I still believed he wouldn’t hurt me, I couldn’t ignore what he was now. He’d shown me the other half of his nature by rescuing me tonight. I was almost out of reasons to put off believing that he was a vampire.

Slowly, so slowly, I was adjusting to reality again. 

“Say something, please,” he said suddenly. I sensed a note of begging in his tone. His hands were gripping the steering wheel like a vice. 

“Thank you,” I said, somewhat softly. “Thank you for finding me.” I had thought I would die—or worse. 

“You shouldn’t—” he sighed, frustrated. “I should be apologizing to you. I should have gotten there sooner. I shouldn’t have lost it like that, I should—”

“No,” I interrupted him quickly, clinging to my rising stubborn streak so I wouldn’t drown in the other things. “I’m...glad you did that.” My face was very hot—I pressed my clammy palms against my cheeks. “Hurt them, I mean.” 

It was a truth I normally wouldn’t admit, but I was no saint. I was glad those men had gotten what was coming to them. My anger tasted like metal in my mouth. There was no telling how many other girls they’d attacked before me. Just thinking about it made me wish they were dead, but I had no doubt Edward had left them alive, just...injured. For now, that was enough. 

I glanced at him. He seemed taken aback by my statement, so I gave him some time to process and looked out the window. Up ahead, there were many more lights and off to one side I could see the waters of the bay. This was the downtown boardwalk district. I recognized it with relief. 

“Oh, hey, there’s the restaurant we...Ah!” I yelped, pulling my bag open and grabbing my cell phone from its depths as quickly as possible. 

There were three missed calls from Jess and five from Angela. I quickly clicked on Angela’s name to call her back.

“Bella? Are you okay? Where are you?” She sounded frantic. 

“I’m so sorry, Angela. I lost track of time but then I ran into some trouble trying to walk to the restaurant.” I could see the sign for the place I was supposed to meet them up ahead. “I’m almost there, I’ll explain everything in a minute.” 

“Okay, okay, we’re outside, we’ll wait.” 

Bless Angela for being so easy to communicate with. I closed the call and sighed. 

Edward didn’t play dumb, which I appreciated. He pulled up right beside Jess’s car and parked without me having to tell him which restaurant it was. 

I hopped out, immediately spotted them, and ran to where they were standing. Angela was fidgeting, probably cold, but Jess looked angry. As soon as she saw me, she marched toward me and pulled me into a fierce hug. 

“How could you do that to us?” she demanded. I smiled and hugged her back. She was warm. It seemed she wasn’t so much angry as she was worried. 

“I’m so sorry. It’s an impossible story.” It really was an impossible story. I’d have to lie again later, tell them something that made sense, but right now I didn’t feel up to it. 

I let Jess go and took a deep breath. 

“Bella, who’s car is that?” I heard Angela ask. I glanced at her, then followed her shocked stare to where Edward was climbing out of a sleek black sports car. 

I hadn’t really absorbed his appearance earlier, but now it was all I could see. He was wearing dark distressed jeans and a black cotton t-shirt beneath that beloved leather jacket, all of which added to the already heart-stopping shape of his jaw and wind-tossed style of his copper curls. This, combined with the slight smirk on his face and the ridiculously expensive car, made all three of us stare for quite a lot longer than was strictly allowed in polite society. 

I snapped my mouth shut and turned away from him, allowing only Jess and Angela to bear witness to my flushed face. Jess struggled to avert her eyes from him, but grinned rather conspicuously at me when she did. 

Maybe I wouldn’t have to lie. Maybe they’d just assume enough to create the story for me. I pressed my lips together. 

“Thank you for driving Bella back,” Angela said to Edward. I was happy to note that her appreciative gaze had morphed into a merely friendly one. 

“It was my pleasure,” Edward said, and his tone made the phrase sound slightly...suggestive. 

Oh, so that was how he was going to play this situation, was it? 

I cleared my throat and turned to him again. “Why don’t you join us for dinner, Edward?” I asked with a smile. “It’s the least I can do.”

His eyes flashed and he opened his mouth to retort with a denial, I was sure, but Jessica surprised me by interrupting him. 

“Actually, Bella...we already ate,” she said with a falsely apologetic expression. Angela glanced at her curiously, which made me doubt this was the truth. Jess grabbed Angela’s hand. “I’m sorry, we were just so hungry. But since you’re here with Edward, why don’t you two stay and eat?” While I gaped at her, she turned her smile on Edward. “You don’t mind driving her home, do you?” 

Edward’s response had me reeling. “Not in the slightest.” 

Before I could protest, Jess dragged Angela—who just smiled apologetically—back to her car and climbed in. I stared at her through the windshield as she winked at me, waved, and drove away into the night. 

Then, we were alone, standing beside the quaint Italian bistro. 

I cupped my elbows with my hands. My heart rhythm was normal again. It was very cold now. 

“Shall we?” Edward murmured, suddenly standing right beside me. He was really in rare form tonight, huh? 

I looked at him wryly, wondering if he was actually going to eat with me. The bistro was an intimate setting. This would appear to all the world like a date. “I’m not terribly hungry,” I said slowly. 

“You need food, whether you feel like it or not, and I want to talk.”

“Are you serious?”

“Deadly,” he grinned.

My heart stuttered and I swallowed, suddenly less cold. “Well then, lead the way.” 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay, dear readers. Hopefully this rather eventful chapter is apology enough for you ;)
> 
> The world really is going crazy, huh? Maybe you're sick of hearing it—I know I am—but if you're old enough, please ensure you're registered to vote and then go to the polls on Election Day and punch that ballot. There is so much in this world that we can do to make a difference, but when you vote you do one even better: you support others who are trying to make a difference too. Our government here in the US hasn't exactly been a good example of this in recent years, but I promise you, there are people trying to get elected because they want to change things for the better, and the President isn't the only one who makes decisions that directly impact your life and your community. 
> 
> I would also encourage you to attend protests, but please ONLY do so if it is safe for you and your family. Don't make your family or community a target for any agency and please don't risk spreading disease to anyone who is vulnerable, including you. Try to listen to those who are braving the current dangerous political climate for a shot in the dark at being heard and making a difference. There is one constant in this country, and that is the belief we—The People—harbor that once we band together, we can affect change.
> 
> “Protest beyond the law is not a departure from democracy; it is absolutely essential to it.” - Howard Zinn
> 
> Sorry to get political in the bottom comment of an AO3 chapter, but I have very little platform and I intend to use it. If I can make one more suggestion, I would turn you toward the author of the quote above. Howard Zinn is a wonderful author, political activist, and philosopher who has summarized this nation's great tragedies more than I could ever hope to. Read a little about his life and his message and it will help you to understand not only why you should care about politics at all, but what you can say and do to have an impact. 
> 
> \- LA LUNE


	10. Chapter Nine - Dinner

We got all the way to the hostess stand before I realized I’d left my bag with my wallet in his car. I asked him to wait while I ran back to get it, but he just shook his head and stopped me. 

“I’m not going to make you pay for a meal I’m forcing you to eat,” he said simply, eyes crinkling a little.

I found that logic hard to argue with, but it still bothered me. I relented only after a moment’s consideration. I could always pay him back later. 

A flustered hostess—honestly, who wouldn’t be flustered when Edward looked like that?—showed us to a table in the center of the dining room. I started to sit, but apparently this would not work for Edward. 

He turned to the hostess, looked into her eyes, and said, in his low persuasive voice, “We’d like something a little more...private, if you please.” 

I could see the wheels in her head grind to a halt and then slowly start back up again, and pitied her. Nevertheless, she did take us into an adjacent room with fewer patrons and offered us a corner booth with significantly dimmer lighting. Edward rewarded her with a smile, and I could already tell that she’d be hyperventilating in the kitchen in a minute. 

I held in my criticism until we were alone, then said, “That was hardly fair.”

He grinned at me...or bared his teeth, I couldn’t be sure. “Gets the job done.” 

I rolled my eyes and slid in.

Our waitress appeared out of thin air before I could even pick up my menu. I suspected she’d seen us walk in. She was fairly pretty, blonde haired and blue-eyed, but I could already tell that she’d decided to ignore me in the hopes of attracting Edward’s...special attention. 

It took some effort not to snap at her that he wasn’t even going to eat. 

“Welcome,” she said, smiling solely at him. “Is there...anything I can get for you?” 

He deferred to me as I raised my eyebrows at her. “A coke?” I turned it into a question because I wasn’t sure she would even hear me. 

“Two cokes,” Edward told her when she apparently did not. 

“Coming right up,” she slapped our table and sauntered away, swinging her hips a little too much for a natural gait. I shook my head in disbelief behind my menu. 

Welcome solitude blanketed us like a fog. Edward didn’t say anything, but I studied his face. He looked like he was listening to something—his expression was both intent and distracted. Curious. 

Our waitress returned to drop off our drinks and take our food order. Once again, Edward had to redirect her question to me when she refused to acknowledge my presence. The look on her face when she turned my direction had me struggling to hold in a laugh. I ordered the mushroom ravioli quickly and Edward ordered nothing. 

“Are you  _ sure _ there’s nothing I can get you?” she asked for the third time, leaning toward him at a suggestive angle. 

“I’m absolutely certain,” he told her flatly, his head tilted slightly and his eyes narrowed. He was annoyed.

I doubted she got the full message behind that expression, but she did finally turn and walk away. 

Once we were really alone, Edward’s shoulders sagged slightly. 

A giggle escaped me, against my will.

“You seem remarkably...normal,” he observed, studying me. 

I put my elbow on the table and my chin in my hand. “That’s my superpower.” 

“With the amount of danger you wind up in, I’m sure it gets plenty of use.” 

“Superhuman self-control hardly makes me comic-book material.”

His voice and expression turned serious. “You’d be surprised how coveted that particular ability actually is.” 

That made a certain amount of sense. I looked down at the table. “So you say, though it’s still not as cool as mind-reading.” 

My eyes flashed up to watch his reaction to this and I was greatly rewarded for my patience.

Edward froze completely—every last copper curl turning statuesque, and his eyes boring holes into the table. 

It was rare to see him so at a loss. My accusation was a shot in the dark, but apparently, I’d hit the bull’s eye. 

I felt gloriously victorious, and a little smug. 

He maintained a carefully blank expression even after thawing, though his jaw ground a little. “When did you...figure it out?” 

“Tonight,” I said vaguely. Jake had tipped me off, but I wouldn’t rat my friend out, even though he hadn’t really thought he was divulging anything. “It was the incident with those men that really convinced me I wasn’t crazy.” He had to have found me in this city somehow, and, remarkably, tracking my phone seemed even  _ less _ likely than reading minds. 

Some minutes passed in silence while he worked through this new status quo. 

By degrees, his face softened. “Have you figured out the catch yet?” 

My eyebrows pinched in consideration, but I only had one theory. “You can’t read my mind?” This had taken longer to puzzle out, but based on the strange way he’d treated me that first day at school, it fit. I understood why he had been pinning assumptions on me during our first real conversation. It seemed we both wanted desperately to know what the other person was thinking. 

He nodded once, clasping his hands above the table. “Correct again. You’re very observant.” 

“No, you just made it so easy,” I teased. “What was it you kept saying? That you, ‘hear things’?”

His responding grin was a little gloating. “Wasn’t for lack of trying.” 

I shook my head at his suddenly smug demeanor even in the face of me voicing his secrets aloud. “You really think you’re hot stuff, don’t you?” 

His eyebrows shot up into his hairline. He didn’t handle me making assumptions about him quite as easily as he made them about me. “Excuse me?” 

“Oh come on,” I said sardonically. “Reading everyone’s thoughts has totally given you a massive ego boost.” I gestured toward the kitchen. “Every time the waitress walks over here, her eyes drip honey and she makes suggestive little double entendres. Her thoughts have to be ridiculous. Even if you profess not to care, this cannot have gone unnoticed.” 

“Oh, I noticed,” he grinned. “ _ Her _ thoughts are like a fog horn. But I take issue with your observation that I think I’m, ‘hot stuff’—” 

I held up my hand to his face, halting any more counter-arguments. He blinked, shocked as he stuttered to a halt. “Regardless of whether you believe yourself to be affected, I know with certainty that she isn’t the first person to hurl such thoughts in your direction, and no one is immune to an ego boost from others thinking they’re attractive. You might not think you act like you’re ‘hot stuff,’ but I feel it’s my duty to inform you that you do. All the time.” 

He looked incredulous, his eyes narrowed. “Oh? And what about you? I hear men's thoughts too, you know. Mike and Eric and Tyler—they all offered you plenty of opportunities to boost your ego.”

I shrugged and took a drink, eyes wandering away. “Yeah, and what of it? I’m pretty ‘hot stuff’ myself.” 

Edward burst into a fit of laughter, drawing the few eyes in the room to him. I found myself unable to keep a straight face. His amusement was infectious, his laughter like music, and I smiled as he slowly regained his composure, running a hand through his hair. 

Then, as if on the flip of a switch, he leaned across the table toward me and gazed into my eyes. 

Little warning bells went off in my brain as I gazed back, but I ignored them—against my better judgement.

“What I would give to know but one of your thoughts,” he said in a soft, low voice that had me instantly hypnotized. This wasn't his usual persuasive voice—no, that I knew all too well. His tone now had my toes curling and my heart doing backflips. 

“Maybe I’ll grant your wish someday,” I breathed, helpless, careless. 

How had this happened so fast? Another superpower? His eyes were liquid gold today without a drop of ink to be found. I hadn’t seen them totally black since that first day, but I remembered it vividly. Knowing what I did now, however, I couldn’t help but wonder if there was more to it than contacts. What would his reaction be if I asked? 

A second of eternity stretched between us like a rubber band and then snapped back into place without warning. As soon as it did, Edward righted his posture and I averted my gaze, realizing with relief that food was traveling to our table. 

Thank goodness. I was suddenly starving for some reason. 

The waitress set a monstrous portion of steaming mushroom ravioli in front of me. It smelled divine and offered me a welcome distraction, so I didn’t hesitate to dig in, sighing with relief as the first warm, cheesy bite melted on my tongue. 

Belatedly, I realized that she was still standing beside our table, awkwardly waiting for...well, I wasn’t entirely sure. 

“Thank you,” Edward said pointedly. 

I caught her slight flash of annoyance before she sauntered off again. 

It was inconsequential—I kept eating. The adrenaline of the incident earlier had clearly left me empty. Some minutes passed before I regained enough equilibrium to talk again. 

“You never told me—why are you in Port Angeles in the first place?” 

He eyed me speculatively, assessing me for some specific criteria, then answered my question with another question. “How much weird can you handle today?” 

I swallowed and considered his question seriously. I’d spent most of the weekend coming to terms with some pretty world-shattering realizations and I was finally getting the answers I craved. What was a little bit more?

I looked him right in the eyes. “Plenty. What have you got?”

Still he hesitated. This truth must have been harder to share. 

“Alice...sensed that you might run into danger,” he said slowly. 

Before I could worry about the word “sensed,” I needed to clarify who he was talking about. “Who is Alice?” 

“My sister.”

I speared another ravioli. “The tall, blonde movie star sister or the shorter one who is always dancing?” 

He chuckled at my distinctions. “Alice would be the dancer. She can also...see the future.” 

Silence grew between us. That bomb would take some time for me to recover from. 

I set down my fork and shook my head. “Your sister Alice...can see the future?”

“More or less,” he said wryly, giving me a little more time to process before proceeding. “The future isn’t set in stone. She can only see what decisions people  _ might _ make and what consequences those choices  _ might _ have. It’s an elusive science.” 

Mind reading. Premonition. Super speed and super strength. Vampires and superpowers. What would Jacob say if I told him this and convinced him to believe it? All his ghost stories were turning out to be nonfiction. The Quileutes had not gotten a single thing wrong yet. 

I stalled by taking another bite and another drink, absorbing this additional information and letting the world shift a little more around me. 

Edward watched me carefully, his curls falling into his eyes and his hands going still on the table. I wondered what reaction he expected from me. 

“What did Alice see happening tonight?” I asked hesitantly, after a moment. 

I wasn’t exactly sure I wanted to know. 

He didn’t look exactly sure he wanted to answer. 

“Nothing specific,” Edward said evasively. I could tell this was a lie, but didn’t press it. “Those men who cornered you in the alley...they could have really hurt you, Bella.”

“I know,” I said, gazing evenly at him. I had known from the moment I froze beside that brute. My own stupidity was still haunting me, and I rubbed my arm as the memories resurfaced, bringing goosebumps with them. 

“You’re cold,” he said, sounding a little disapproving—of me or of himself? Immediately, he took off his jacket and handed it across the table to me. 

His face was so intense that I blushed, unable to subdue the thrill that shot through me as I grasped the soft leather. “Thank you,” I said, my voice sounding strange even to me. I slipped my arms into it, not even minding that the jacket felt like a refrigerator and the sleeves were far too long for my arms. I tried not to sniff it, but I knew it smelled like him—clean and sweet. It would make me lightheaded. 

Carefully, I picked up my fork again, this time wary of getting any food on his jacket. “Do you mind answering another question?” I asked. 

He was instantly defensive. “That depends.” 

“It’s about the mind-reading. I’m just curious...that first day of school…”

“Yes,” he looked away, ashamed. “That was...part of it. In the cafeteria, when I first saw you, the silence of your mind was...maddening.” His head shook. “It’s never happened before.”

“Never?” I was surprised. 

“No. No one else has ever been closed off from me. It’s rare that we...my kind, are taken by surprise. I’m sorry to say that I handled it very poorly.” 

His kind. Vampires, or mind readers? I didn’t have the courage to ask. 

“Is there something wrong with me?” I wondered aloud, trying to understand why I would be the exception. 

He laughed and leaned across the table again, eyes full of disbelief. “I admit that I can read minds—that my sister can see the future—and you think there might be something wrong with you?” he asked. 

I sighed. “I don’t think I’m  _ damaged _ , but there has to be a reason, right?” 

“Most likely, yes,” he acquiesced. 

“You have some theories,” I accused. 

He shook his head. “Let me get back to you on that.” 

Maybe he was trying not to freak me out, but I couldn’t very well force him to tell me. I picked up my drink, but then realized it was empty. He slid his untouched one across the table to me and I muttered my thanks before accepting it. 

“So mind reading…” I mused, “and premonition. What else is there?”

He deliberated for a moment, but seemed to decide I could handle the rest. “My brother, Jasper—the blond,” he clarified before I could ask, “—can sense and influence emotional responses.”

How unusual. I considered the implications of that, then remembered suddenly the short scene I’d witnessed the day Tyler asked me to prom. Alice had laughed, and Jasper had relaxed almost immediately, and even smiled. He must be susceptible to others’ moods all the time. 

“That must suck,” I sighed, toying with the straw. 

“Indeed.” Edward was studying me closely. 

I returned my attention to my food, but realized that only scraps remained. I’d completely cleaned out the huge bowl.

“Are you ready to go?” Edward asked me. 

I nodded, and watched him place a large bill on the table and stand, not bothering to wait for the waitress to bring the check. I couldn’t say I blamed him. 

We walked back out to his fancy car. The night was much darker than it had been before, but I didn’t find it threatening now that Edward was beside me. It did make it hard for me to determine the hour, however. 

“Thank you for dinner,” I said formally. 

“It wasn’t an entirely altruistic action,” he chuckled. 

“By the way,” I paused as he opened the passenger side door for me. “What is this?” 

He followed my gaze, then shrugged. “My other car.” 

I rolled my eyes and slid inside. “Right.” 

Once seated, he blasted the heat for my benefit and told me to put my seatbelt on, an order I complied with willingly. 

Then Edward peeled out of the parking space and out of Port Angeles like a bat out of Hell. 

My stomach dropped and I eyed the speedometer with wide eyes, waiting for the needle to stop at 70, then 85, then 100. Lights flew past the windows like laser beams and signs became unreadable. I sucked in a breath.

Absolutely insane—and he told me I attracted danger!

“I assure you, my driving is perfectly safe,” he said, seeing my face. 

“For someone with your reflexes, maybe,” I muttered, gripping the seatbelt across my chest. “If we crash, I’m instant toast, but mark my words, Charlie will kill you later.” 

He laughed but didn’t slow down. 

Silence fell between us, but I could feel myself growing anxious. Precious seconds of the hour-long drive were slipping away—faster, thanks to his insane driving—and there was still so much I needed to know. When would I get another opportunity like this? 

“Thank you again, by the way,” I said, unable to come up with a better means of starting conversation. “That’s...two times now, that you’ve saved my life?” 

He eyed me in his peripheral vision. “I think the count is higher than that.” 

“Okay, well, two  _ serious _ near-death experiences then. I don’t consider fainting to be quite that dangerous.”

“You didn’t hear the thoughts flicking through Mike’s head,” he muttered darkly. 

I froze, not having considered that, then shuddered as I did. “Right…” Maybe Jess was more in over her head than she realized. I would address that with her later. 

“Excluding the fainting, though, you should be aware...there was a third time your life was in mortal danger,” he said quietly. 

After a moment or two of silent deliberation, I ventured softly, “It was that first day, wasn’t it? In Biology.”

“So you do remember.” His grip on the steering wheel tightened.

Of course I remembered. I could still see the glare on his face and feel the loathing rolling off him in waves. It still sparked anger within me. “Was it just my mind that made you want to kill me?” I had to ask, but my voice came out bitter. 

His eyes were trained carefully on the road. “Actually...it was your mind that distracted me long enough to stop myself.”

“I thought you couldn’t hear my mind.” 

“I can’t, and...every time I looked at you, it was like...like reaching for the top step on a staircase that I  _ knew _ was there, but couldn’t be felt. It threw me, again and again, just long enough to remember that I didn’t want to be a monster—that I could fight my nature like Carlisle believed I could.” 

“Why?” I begged to know. “Why did you struggle so much with me, and no one else?” 

He hesitated. “It’s not just your quiet mind that makes you unique. You can’t know this...but to me, your specific scent...it drives me crazy. It makes it harder for me to control my...base nature.”

I stared at him blankly for several heartbeats...and then just burst out laughing. He turned to look at me with a startled expression, possibly wondering if I was still in shock. Maybe I was. After all, he’d just saved my life again and then admitted to wanting me dead himself. 

This conversation was hard to process. It was different than it had been with Jacob. On Saturday, Jacob had told me everything in a hypothetical sense. Those truths were just stories. None of it was real yet. 

_ Well, it’s real now.  _

“You like how I smell?” I asked in disbelief, my eyebrows drawn together. It was only fair, I supposed. I liked how he smelled too. I burrowed deeper into his jacket at the reminder. 

“It’s…a little more complicated than that,” he said, then shook his head. “I don’t know how to explain it.” 

“What would you have done, then, if you hadn’t stopped yourself?” I pushed him, almost giddy now that he was admitting to things. Maybe the consequences would come later, but he hadn’t tried to eat me yet, and we’d been alone for a while now. I found I liked flirting with danger. 

And I had high hopes this trend would continue. 

His eyes were narrowed and heated when he turned to look at me this time. He refused to answer. 

“You can’t frighten me,” I told him point blank, completely confident now. 

“You should be frightened. You would be safer.” 

“Look at my track record,” I said. “Do you really believe that?” 

“I used to,” he answered honestly. 

“Tell me what you would have done. Surely you had a plan,” I teased. “What, was it to kill everyone and  _ then _ drink my blood, or vice versa?” 

He flinched when I voiced the ugly truth, but the car didn’t swerve into a tree, which I was thankful for. I smirked as he tried to decide how to respond. Maybe it was wrong to be so smug, but I was proud of my ability to accept this strange new world without wanting to crawl into the back of my closet. 

“You shouldn’t make light of it,” he sounded angry. 

“The alternative is worse,” I assured him. 

“You have clearly known for some time. How did you figure it out?” he demanded. 

I couldn’t out Jacob as my source. It seemed that there would always be someone’s secrets to protect. “Narrowed it down. It was the aversion to sunlight that really sold you out. I just took a stab.” 

It was impossible to determine from his expression if he bought this lie or not. Either way, he continued. 

“So you’ve known for…?” 

I grinned. “A few days.”

“Yet you still agreed to be alone with me,” he said flatly. “You’re sitting here in this car with no control over where it’s going, yet you don’t seem to be afraid that I might suddenly pull off to the side and murder you.”

“I told you, you can’t frighten me,” I repeated, then shrugged. “And besides, Jess and Angela saw us together. Even if you made it look like an accident, the whole town would stand behind my father with torches and pitchforks. I also have to figure that, since you’ve actively worked to prevent my death  _ three _ times now, I’m entitled to feel safe in your presence.” 

He was aghast. “I was right. You are more than a magnet for danger. You are a masochist—a daredevil. Is there no form of mortal peril you won’t actively seek out?”

“It’s a rush, I’ll admit,” I laughed again. 

“Is there no element of my existence that gives you pause?” he asked. 

I thought it over, and then hesitated as something did come to mind.

“Say it,” he snapped, but he sounded nervous. 

“How old are you?” I finally asked, studying him. 

That made  _ him _ laugh, though not with much humor. “I’m eighteen.”

“How long have you been eighteen?” I elaborated. 

“For...a while,” he smiled crookedly, staring ahead out the windshield and rubbing his jaw with one hand.

I decided I could live with that answer for now and tried to think of some other questions. 

“You walk around in the daytime just fine, but you avoid direct sunlight. Explain that.” 

“Too much sun has a...strange effect on my kind.”

I raised an eyebrow. “What, like it burns you to ash?” 

He chuckled. “No, more like...it dampens our inhibitions. It’s safer for us at night or in places like Forks where sunlight is constantly filtered. We aren’t as likely to...slip up.” 

I thought about that for a second, remembering every time he ran toward me with inhuman speed at school. If he thought that was control, I couldn’t imagine what he considered a “slip-up”.

I changed topics. “What do you eat?” 

“Don’t you mean, ‘ _ who _ do you eat?’”

“You don’t have fangs.” 

“Fangs aren’t necessary, canines are enough if you’ve got a good bite,” he snapped his teeth together for emphasis, eliciting a sharp clicking sound, “and we eat animals, same as you.”

“The same as me?” I raised one eyebrow. Thanks to films, I could easily picture a vampire drinking blood from a human, but an animal was another thing entirely. Surely he wasn’t insinuating they bit into the animals while they were still...alive. 

“More or less.” He took a deep breath. “Others of our kind call us ‘vegetarians.’” 

As opposed to carnivore vampires, I supposed, who drank human blood. I was admittedly curious what that looked like, but thought it best not to say so. 

“But you still get cravings,” I said flatly. 

“Only one real craving for me, lately,” he gazed at me meaningfully. I swallowed, and he continued. “It gets easier to ignore with practice. Carlisle has never tasted human blood—the only vampire ever to accomplish such a feat, to my knowledge.” 

I could read between the lines—Edward had tasted human blood before. But that felt like a can of worms I didn’t want to open yet, so I put it back in the cupboard. 

“Tell me about your eyes,” I said softly.

“You did notice them rather quickly.” 

“Do they change when you haven’t had blood in a while?” 

“They get darker.” He didn’t seem surprised that I’d figured it out. “Black eyes indicate thirst. We don’t totally understand why.”

“They’re bright right now. So this weekend, you were...not camping?” 

“I went hunting with my brother,” he smiled slightly, “Emmett.”

_ Hunting. _ That was a term I needed to know. I paused for a moment. “So let me see if I can get this straight—” he looked at me curiously, “—Alice is your sister with the dark hair, Jasper is your brother with the light hair, Emmett is your brother who looks like a linebacker for the NFL, Carlisle is your father the doctor...what is your other sister’s name?” 

“Rosalie,” he answered. “There’s also my mother, Esme.” 

I repeated all the names to myself quickly, trying to make sure I remembered them. “Can I meet them?” 

He seemed more shocked by this request than by anything else I had said since we got in the car. “What?” 

“What?” I stared at him blankly. “You said two of them wanted to meet me. I want to meet them too.” 

His expression indicated that he wasn’t really keen on the idea. I needed to convince him. 

“Edward,” I said softly, tilting my head a little, raising my eyebrows, smiling slightly. “Let me meet your family. Please?” I couldn’t act, but I could definitely express how fervently I wanted this. 

His eyes caught on mine, a direct line of lovely charged energy snapping into place between us as they did, and I saw quickly that I’d won. 

He sighed, relenting, and about four seconds later, I heard his phone buzz in his pocket. He didn’t move to answer it, but his expression abruptly became amused. “That’ll be Alice.” 

It took me a moment to remember that his sister could see the future and that that might be the reason she was calling. I wondered what she’d seen when he agreed to let me meet his family. Based on his smile, I was betting she was on my side. 

We had entered Forks now, which I realized only because Edward’s car had slowed to below a crawl. 

“Will it be sunny tomorrow?” I asked him, looking out at the dark trees lining the road ahead. 

“I’ll see you at school.” 

“Do you promise?” I smiled. 

“Scout’s honor.” 

“You were so not a scout,” I muttered.

He laughed as he turned a few corners and then pulled to a stop in front of Charlie’s house. 

The night was officially over. I could see lights on in the house through the gaps in the drawn curtains. 

A sigh escaped me as I unclicked my seatbelt. But before I could even collect my bag, Edward had zipped out and around to open the passenger’s side door for me. 

My eyes didn’t leave his as I stepped out. “Thank you.” 

“My pleasure,” he said with a self-satisfied smile. 

The darkness encircled us and suddenly, I wanted nothing more than to kiss him. That was the tricky part, because the time we’d spend together had felt like a date—the dim light in the restaurant, the way he opened every door for me, the fact that he’d given me his jacket—it was all textbook dating stuff, except...it had been so much bigger than that. So much more important.

Before, I’d been certain he liked me too, but now I was hesitant—maybe he was only curious about a human girl with a mind he couldn't read who smelled better than everyone else. I knew where I stood, but not where he did. I wasn’t giving up, but I wasn’t going to jump the gun either. 

With a small sigh I started sliding his jacket off my shoulders. 

But he protested immediately, stepping toward me in a blur, and suddenly he was close—closer even than he had been that day by the trees. I inhaled sharply.

“Keep it,” he said softly, his hands securing the lapels in front of me again. With him this close, my head had to crane much further back in order to see his face and all I could focus on was how nice he smelled and how much I wanted to kiss him. 

If he read my desire in my eyes, he didn’t let on. Instead he smiled and stepped back again, moving toward the nose of his car. “Get some sleep, Bella.” 

My heart was dancing as I watched him climb into the black vehicle and drive away, wishing he didn’t have to go home and hoping Charlie wasn’t watching through the front window. I was helpless to do anything but stare until I lost sight of his taillights around the corner. 

Then I smiled to myself, burrowed into his leather jacket, and walked up to the house. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm adding this chapter now just in case I don't have another chance to update in the coming weeks. Hope you all enjoy :)
> 
> \- LA LUNE


	11. Chapter Ten - Obsessed

Charlie hadn’t been watching out the window, thankfully. He was barely awake when I walked in, surprised by the time—it was, impossibly, only 8:30. I saw that he was staring at the sports network on television, eyes half shut, really only waiting up for me. Touched, I relieved him of his night watch duties and followed him up the stairs. He didn’t even register that I was wearing a boy’s jacket. My mom would definitely have jumped on that immediately, no matter how tired she was. 

I was a different person than I had been four hours ago. So much had happened since shopping with my friends that I could barely wrap my head around it. By the time I made it to my room, my wheels had gone out from under me and it was all I could do to just prepare for bed and fall into mine. 

I was careful, however, to hang Edward’s jacket up neatly. I also dug the handful of books I’d bought out of my bag and put them on my bookshelf to arrange later. It seemed like a million years had passed since I was standing in that bookstore. I was still happy I’d gone, though. 

Before succumbing to the oblivion of sleep, I texted Jess and Angela to tell them Edward had brought me home safely and in one piece. Both of them texted back immediately asking for details, but my eyes were fighting for priority, demanding I close them. 

It could wait. It could all wait just one night, surely. 

I awoke to a familiar alien world full of swirling mist and green moss blanket-wrapped trees. The sun was banished again, and I was bummed, but it was hard to be too upset now that I knew what it meant for Edward.

The dreary weather still made me tired, however. I threw on a gray sweater and some jeans and bound my curls up into a high ponytail, trying to remember where I’d put my boots. I was moving through the motions until my eyes landed on Edward’s jacket, hanging right where I had hooked it last night. 

I picked it up gently. The leather was still as buttery soft as ever. Even without pressing it to my nose, I knew it’d smell like him. 

Without giving myself time to overthink it, I slipped my arms into the sleeves and rolled them up so my hands could be free. 

I didn’t realize I was running late until I made it downstairs to see that Charlie was nowhere to be found. I cursed and scrounged up a granola bar, stuffing it into my mouth as I rushed out the front door and locked it. The thick morning fog clung to my face and hair with such ferocity that I felt more like I was swimming through it than walking through it as I made my way to my car. I was grateful for Edward’s jacket—was leather usually this warm?

I froze midway down the front walk when I realized with a start that my truck had a visitor. 

The big black SUV parked behind her in the driveway was all too familiar to me, as was the person leaning casually against the driver’s side door with his arms crossed. 

I swallowed and pulled the granola bar out of my mouth, momentarily dumbstruck. This was so not fair. I was not mentally prepared to face him yet. I still felt half asleep. 

When my feet didn’t move an inch more, he dashed up to stand in front of me and smiled, curls bouncing. “Will you ride to school with me today?” 

Mutely, I nodded, and then followed him to his car. I sent one apologetic look to the Frankentruck as I passed her, but I had already said yes to Edward’s offer. 

I was instantly glad that I had, however, when I climbed in and realized that all the heaters were blasting warm air and it was plenty toasty inside. Given that Edward didn’t have a jacket and didn’t seem at all bothered by this fact, I suspected the warmth was for my benefit. 

My eyes drank in Edward’s form as he climbed into the driver’s seat. He looked as carelessly heart-stopping as usual. I tried to put my finger on what, specifically, made him so attractive to me—because it couldn’t be as simple as his jeans and cotton shirt. 

After some consideration, I finally settled on his eyes. I liked a lot of things, but his eyes were my favorite. Even with all of his years of practice, his acting skills weren’t so good that his eyes didn’t betray him when he looked at me. They were my most reliable source of transparency. 

But his lips were a close second. 

“Are you ready?” he asked me, his eyebrows raised. 

I hastily averted my gaze, blushing and stuffing the rest of my granola bar in my mouth. How long had I been staring? I must really be half asleep. “Mmhm.” 

He put the car into reverse and backed out of my driveway. 

“So, where are your siblings?” I asked once I could manage it. 

“They took Rosalie’s car. She was thrilled to use it, actually.” 

Part of me was disappointed but another, larger part was happy that this morning was not their first impression of me. “Why? Is it as fancy as your ‘other car’?” 

He frowned. “Fancier. Ostentatious, actually.” 

I laughed. “What’s wrong with that?” 

“If you hadn’t noticed, we kind of stick out enough on our own without driving bright red convertibles in forty-degree weather.” 

I shook my head. “Your logic is flawed. If you’re going to stick out anyway, then you might as well do it in style.” 

He flashed a crooked grin at me. “And here I was worried that you and Rose might not get along. How foolish.” 

“Incredibly foolish,” I agreed. “Why have such fancy cars if you’re afraid to drive them?” 

“We love to drive them,” he chuckled. “It’s all about the speed.”

I rolled my eyes. “Forks seems like a counterintuitive location if that’s your hobby.” 

“Well,” he paused, “this may surprise you, but we don’t often pose as underage teens in tiny towns.”

“Oh.” I hadn’t considered that, but now that he said it, it made a lot of sense. “So, why are you here, then? I mean, why go through the pain of high school if you don’t have to?” 

“That story will take a lot more time to explain than we currently have,” he said regretfully. 

He was pulling into the school parking lot now, and I immediately understood what he meant by “ostentatious”. I remembered thinking on that first day how oddly shiny his black SUV had been, but that was nothing compared to the shock I felt upon seeing the cherry-red cloth-top convertible nesting like a jewel in a sea of muted paint jobs. 

Other students had noticed as well and were not pretending otherwise.

“Definitely foolish,” I muttered to myself, and heard Edward laugh. 

I beat him to the punch getting out of the car this time—the constraints of a crowd of ogling students prevented him from zipping around the car faster than I could pop the door open. He looked disgruntled as he stood beside the front of the vehicle watching me climb out, but I just walked up to him with a broad smile. 

“Humans are so slow,” he grumbled, but he didn’t complain anymore as he walked beside me. Apparently, it was just other humans. 

Up ahead, I spotted Jessica standing under an awning and burning a hole through me with her intense gaze. I’d put her and Angela off last night, but the piper had to be paid. 

“Tell me what she’s thinking,” I begged Edward quietly. 

I watched him listen to her thoughts, then he smiled. “Your friend is surprisingly protective of you.”

It was nice to hear, but that told me nothing. “Not helpful,” I hissed. 

“She will ask you if we’re dating,” he said, “but not in front of me. In class.” 

I considered that seriously, trying to decide how I would answer her, then another horrible thought occurred to me. “What’s your range with that thing?” 

His smile only widened. 

“Do not listen to my private conversations!” I commanded, face heating from embarrassment at the very thought. 

His shoulders raised and his expression was anything but innocent. “It’s not really something I can turn off.” 

My hands clenched into fists and I was certain my expression looked no less angry. He really knew how to push all my buttons. 

When we at last reached Jessica, I glared at him once and then abruptly strode ahead without speaking. 

“Hey Jess,” I said with false brightness, looping my arm through hers and leaving Edward behind without a parting glance. She sputtered, confused, as her head whipped back and forth between the two of us, but thankfully didn’t argue. 

Behind us, I heard him laughing loudly. “Stay warm, Bella,” he called. I clenched my jaw and marched faster.

First period was a nightmare barrage of questions from Jessica that I answered with as much stubborn adherence to the facts as I could manage. 

“You two looked chummy,” she observed, baiting.

I nodded, barely glancing at her. “Edward picked me up for school this morning.”

“Ooh! What happened last night?” she demanded to know, wide eyes imploring. 

“We ate dinner,” I said blithely. 

“Was it nice?” she fished deeper. 

“It was...Italian.” 

She rolled her eyes. “I know the restaurant, Bella, stop being so evasive.”

I shrugged, tapping my pen against my lips as I tried to think of more concrete details. “Well...he opened all the doors for me, ignored the annoyingly flirtatious waitress, and when I was cold he took off his jacket for me.” I didn’t mention that the jacket itself had been colder than I was at the time. I hadn’t cared then, though, and didn’t care now. 

This was more acceptable to her. “Is that his jacket?” she asked, suddenly taking in what I was wearing. 

I blushed and chewed on the pen. “Maybe.” 

Jess had a fit about it, telling me all sorts of things I hadn’t paid attention to, like the designer label and the likely price. After seeing Edward’s “other car” and Rosalie’s drool-worthy coupe, the jacket didn’t faze me. Realizing it might just be my salvation, I coaxed Jess into long-winded speculation of Rosalie’s convertible and let her go. The conversation devolved after that, but at least I successfully prevented her from asking if Edward and I were dating. 

I had to answer to Angela in my next class. Her questions were harder to evade than Jessica’s—I actually wanted to confide in her, because I knew she would listen. But I didn’t trust Edward not to eavesdrop, even though I forbade him. 

“Did you have a good time after we left?” she asked me with a smile.

I considered that, then nodded. “We just talked, but it was nice.” 

“I was a little jealous of you, getting to ride home in that car,” she teased jokingly. 

I laughed, then flushed a little. “He came to my house again this morning.” 

“He picked you up for school today?” she asked with disbelief. 

I nodded, smiling a little. “Yeah, it surprised me too.” 

“That’s really considerate of him.” 

It was. I had thought about a lot of things related to Edward and his new hobby of trying to keep me alive, but he had been fairly considerate by human standards. Maybe he wasn’t just acting on old habits—maybe he was actually interested in me, and not just my strangely silent mind. 

“Did you two make future plans?” Angela asked me, drawing me back out of my thoughts. 

I started to reply with an automatic negative, but then I remembered we did. “Actually, yeah—we’re going hiking on Saturday.” 

Angela got a particular gleam in her eye. “Not the most original date, but it offers plenty of alone time.” 

Her statement threw me off guard. Was it a date now? Had it always been a date and I’d just been too caught up in everything else to notice? 

Such thoughts troubled me all the way to lunch, and though I was happy to see him waiting outside for me, I was still distracted. Whatever he saw on my face seemed to worry him.

“I tried not to listen,” he said after a minute, which told me he had been listening—at least to some of it. I couldn’t even find it in me to be annoyed anymore. 

“What is it like?” I wondered aloud, grabbing a tray and starting to fill it. “I mean people interacting with you, I understand—you could tell if they’re lying or if they’re...attracted to you.” I looked down. “But if you’re in Jessica’s head when I’m talking to her, can you really hear everything I say?” 

He seemed to be trying to figure out how best to explain. “Not unless she hears it, by which I mean, she has to be focusing on you and what you’re saying. If she listens to the teacher or thinks about her notes, I lose sight of you.” He paused. “You were rather clever, getting her to think about Rosalie’s car.” 

I felt slightly vindicated as I paid for my lunch and waited for him to pay for his, knowing I’d be more likely to eat it than he would. I wondered if he even bothered to get it just in case I wanted more food. But thinking about that made me think about what Angela had said, about him being considerate, which brought me back around to the dating question again, which was a downward spiral at this point. 

I wondered if he would take me to his family’s table. When I looked over at it, only the dark-haired girl, Alice, was looking back. She seemed angry, maybe frustrated, and her feet were tapping against the linoleum rapidly. Edward didn’t look at her as he walked in the opposite direction, but I suspected he heard her talking to him in his mind. 

We sat down across from each other at a table in the far corner, where almost no one else was sitting. 

“Are you embarrassed of me?” I asked, half joking. 

He looked shocked and troubled by my question. “Of course not. Why would you think that?” 

I gestured to the table and it’s considerable distance from both my friends and his family. I knew there had to be a good reason, but obviously it hadn’t occurred to him that I might be bothered by the choice.

He was thwarted by not being able to read my mind, but I was also trying to puzzle out what he was thinking at any given moment. We were on fairly equal footing.

“Sorry,” he said, nudging his tray toward me in frustration. “I guess there are a few reasons, but I haven’t been very transparent.” 

He was, quite possibly, the least transparent person I’d ever interacted with. It was telling that he was barely aware of that fact. 

“Start talking,” I said, taking a bite out of an apple. 

“We can’t sit with my family yet because...well, quite frankly, you smell too good. They can all control themselves—” he paused, making me wonder to what degree that was true “—but I can hear their thoughts, and the reminder of how you smell from multiple sources at once is...hard for me.” He seemed ashamed of that fact. “I’ll get better, I promise, but just today…” 

Deliberately, I reached over and placed my hand on top of his to stop his speech. He froze like a photograph before my skin touched his, which let me know that he could have stopped me, but he was allowing me this much. 

It was a start. 

“I understand. We don’t have to move too fast.” 

He gradually started to shift again, after a moment. I kept my hand on his while I waited. 

Suddenly his hand flipped beneath mine and held it, his long fingers sliding around my wrist. I traced the inside of his palm and thought I might have seen him shiver. 

“Why does it not bother you?” he asked softly. 

“Because it’s you,” I said honestly. 

He liked that answer. 

We were quiet for a few more moments as he held my hand, and I marveled—this small thing, just touching hands, shouldn’t have been such a big deal, but it was. To both of us, it was a step we needed to be sure the other wanted to make.

I could have sat there staring at him and reveling in the joy of this moment for the rest of lunch, but I was startled out of my daze by someone scraping the chair beside me loudly against the linoleum. 

Much to my shock, and Edward’s apparent dismay, his sister was here. His hand slid away from mine. 

“Hi, I’m Alice,” the girl said cheerfully as she sat down beside me. Her eyes twinkled with amusement. “I can’t stay for too long, Jasper gets anxious, but I thought it would be best to introduce myself to you now.”

It took me a minute to register what she had even said, I was so lost in watching her say it. “Nice to meet you,” I said lamely. 

“Alice,” Edward said tensely. “I told you not to do this.” 

She rolled her eyes and completely ignored him. “Edward wants to bring you by the house on Sunday, but doesn’t believe me when I tell him that it would be better to space us out a little.” She pouted, as if this was a horribly mean thing to do. My primal instinct was to agree with her. “This is the best I can manage, I’m sorry.” 

Though my head was reeling, I was thoroughly grateful for her forethought. Exactly when had Edward planned on inviting me to his house? I turned to look at him and ask. 

“Sunday morning,” Alice answered before I could. 

I blinked at her, wondering if anyone ever got used to that, but I refocused two seconds later. 

“Sunday morning?” I said incredulously. 

Alice waved a hand and addressed her brother with smirk. “See?” 

Edward looked like he was trying very hard not to shout. He was radiating annoyance. “Alice, go back to the table.” 

She pretended not to hear him and turned to me again. “Please say you’ll come,” she begged, pressing her palms together. “I’ve been dying to meet you, but Edward has been keeping you to himself.”

“I’d love to come,” I accepted her offer immediately, just in case Edward was starting to debate even offering at this point. 

Alice’s face broke out into the most blinding smile I’d ever seen. “Wonderful!” she said, suddenly hugging me. The movement was so quick that I couldn’t respond fast enough to decide whether to hug her back before she had let go and stood up from the table. I was left reeling. 

“See you on Sunday!” she said brightly. Then she skipped back to the other Cullens, drawing nearly every eye in the room as she did so. 

When I looked back at Edward, he was rubbing his face with one hand as if he had a headache. That made a certain amount of sense. Alice was like a tiny hurricane. 

“Do you really want to come?” he finally said, lowering his hand and studying me with a guarded expression. 

“Of course—I told you I want to meet your family.” Though, Alice had made me somewhat apprehensive about letting them all converge on me at once. 

He looked like he was trying to determine whether or not to believe me. This was more than a chance to meet his family, however—I’d get to see where he lived. I kept eating, knowing I’d regret it later if I didn’t, while mulling the problem over. A few minutes passed in silence. 

“What are you thinking?” he asked me abruptly.

I paused before my next bite and smiled. “I want to drive.” I didn’t have to say “on Sunday,” he’d know what I meant. 

“No,” he brushed the request off easily. “Your truck is slow.”

“Hey!” I protested, angry. “Do not insult the Frankentruck.” 

He looked confused, and then laughed. “I’m sorry...the what?” 

I rolled my eyes. “Inside joke. My truck is an amalgamation of parts from different models, like Frankenstein’s monster.” Thinking about that brought Jacob to mind, but even though he was my friend, I didn’t want to mention him to Edward. I didn’t know what the chances were of him clueing in about the treaty should I mention knowing someone from the Quileute tribe with enough friendliness to have an inside joke, but I didn’t want to take my chances. 

“You really love that truck, huh?” Edward said, glowering in the face of this revelation. 

“I really do.”

He paused, then relented. “Fine, you can drive on Sunday, but don’t get used to it.”

I grinned in victory, knowing this was just the beginning I’d definitely be driving my truck more often than he liked. 

Lunch was over, so I dumped the food—far more than I felt right tossing, I’d have to tell him to scale back—before we walked to Biology. 

I could feel the eyes of my friends on us as we made our way out into the light drizzle. Definitely not preferable. Sooner or later, I’d have to find a way to bridge the gap between them and Edward. That could take a while. His reputation was well-established. 

Our biology teacher was apparently content to let us watch some outdated science videos for our lesson, which had the whole class buzzing with excitement. 

Edward sat beside me at our table, and I noted with pleasure that he didn’t seem concerned with maintaining a proper distance today. When he put his arms on the table, his shoulder bumped lightly into mine, causing me to turn and shoot him a playful look of warning. This close, his unique cologne was all around me. If he was going to sit this close to me all class period while we pretended to listen to a disembodied voice drone on about the ecosystem, he was going to find he’d bitten off more than he could chew. 

Our teacher pushed play, starting the video, and then walked over to the wall to turn the light off. 

I could never have predicted the effect this would have.

It was fine...at first, but I gradually became more and more conscious of Edward’s proximity to me in the dim light. The rainy skies only made it darker and we were in the far back of the classroom, almost alone. 

Strangely uncomfortable, I shifted slightly, but this proved to be a mistake. My knee brushed against his beneath the table, and my awareness of him seemed to skyrocket. My heart rate shot up in anticipation, but of what? My senses were in overdrive suddenly—every breath I took was too loud, every small movement like an earthquake, and he was so close, the scent of him was making me lightheaded. 

I heard him chuckle, if you could call it that—it was little more than a breath, but it gave me the courage to look at him. 

In the darkness, just as it had the night before, his pale face shone like a beacon. His smile was wry, almost rueful, and as he became aware that I was looking at him, his molten gold eyes rose to meet mine. 

The weight of that gaze was immense. 

Slowly, with the same deliberateness that I had shown earlier, he reached across the tabletop to take my hand in his. 

Maybe it was the icy nature of his skin, but I could have sworn I felt electricity buzzing where we connected. I had never felt like this before with anyone. He hadn’t even kissed me, but I was alive with the desire to be closer to him. 

Part of me wanted to chuckle at the absurdity of the whole situation. Was I really such a hormonal teenager after all? 

I didn’t understand it. But holding his hand helped, just as it had that day in the nurse’s office. It was better to touch him and know he was there than to sit and obsess while driving myself crazy. I didn’t want to think about the ramifications of that realization yet. 

Class took forever to trudge through, each second as long as three. By the time our teacher turned the lights back on, I was leaning against Edward and had to force myself to sit up and let go of his hand. My fingers ached and I glanced to see if he was affected.

He looked a little dazed, which made me laugh and brought a slightly crooked smile to his face. 

Some scary vampire he was turning out to be. 

As we were gathering our things, I didn’t miss Mike’s pointedly disdainful look as he walked past us on his way out the door. He was practically sneering with derision. Annoyance and anger surged through me, shattering my warm mood. It wouldn’t have bothered me, except that I knew he’d keep that expression in our next class, and I didn’t want to deal with him. 

“That’s a problem,” Edward said, glaring in the direction Mike had disappeared. 

“What is he thinking?” I asked, slightly worried about the answer as I stood and studied his face.

“He’s...obsessive,” Edward nearly growled. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up, aware of the threat. “You should tell Jessica she’s wasting her time. I’m not sure he can be taught a lesson at this point.” 

After considering that for a moment, I leaned over and placed my hand on his shoulder, tilting my head to look him in the eyes. “If he tries anything, can I count on you to help bury the body?”

He was quiet and serious for a moment longer, his head cocked to one side. Then he smirked. “Emmett is already volunteering to be your getaway driver.” 

Apparently Edward wasn’t the only one eavesdropping today. Nevertheless, I was reassured, and I had a feeling Emmett and I were going to get along just fine. 

Without really pausing to consider the consequences, I grinned, straightened, and then walked off in the direction Mike had gone. 

...

In gym, Mike didn’t talk to me immediately. 

He had been notably less friendly since the day I yelled at him in Biology, and today he studiously ignored me while we all made a poor attempt at badminton. I knew from Jessica that he had been reluctant to engage in any sort of dating activities with her, but hadn’t backed out of the spring dance. 

I didn’t know what was going on between them, exactly, but I didn’t really want to know. All I cared about was addressing this possessiveness problem. 

It wasn’t as though I hadn’t suspected he felt this way. Mike stared at me entirely too often at school and was always getting angry with other boys for talking to me, even poor Ben who was genuinely friendly and just trying to woo Angela. Since Edward and I had been talking more, I’d caught Mike glaring at him when he thought no one was paying attention. Jessica confided in me, reluctantly, about his angry outburst when she told him about leaving me and Edward in Port Angeles together. 

She had brushed it off as weirdly protective and been annoyed, but since then, I had been seriously concerned. 

This was a tricky situation, though. Mike hadn’t outright harassed me nor was he going around claiming to date me in secret like Tyler was. No one connected the dots but me, and it wasn’t as though I could cite Edward’s mind reading in the accusation.

How was I supposed to approach him? He’d most definitely deny everything. 

Only one option occurred to me, but I wasn’t eager to choose it. I wavered on the edge of acting for half of gym class, before finally deciding that there were few better places or times than this. 

If possible, I had to make Mike snap. 

“Hey, Mike,” I started easy, coming up to stand beside him. We were both waiting our turns, rackets in hand. 

“Bella?” His expression when he looked at me was hopeful. Once, I had likened him to a golden retriever, with his blond hair and easy smile, but it was hard for me to see that now. So much had changed since that first week. 

Nervously, I swallowed. 

“Did Jessica show you her dress for the dance?” I asked him as brightly as I could manage. “She looks amazing in it.”

His shoulders squared a bit. “Yeah, she showed me so I could get a matching tie.” 

I nodded as if this made sense and crossed my arms, trying to figure out how to steer the conversation toward Edward. 

But I shouldn’t have bothered. Mike made a bee-line. 

“So are you and Cullen going to the dance together now?” he blurted, eyes trained on my face. 

We most definitely weren’t, but that wasn’t going to have any effect. “Maybe.” I said slowly, watching him closely.

I could see Mike grinding his teeth. “Seriously?”

“Yes.”. 

“So, what, are you two dating now?” 

I gathered my nerve for this answer, hoping it wasn’t a lie. “That’s right.”

His eyebrows shot up as he scoffed, shifting to face me. “Really? A Cullen, huh?” 

I was confused by his comment. Where was this animosity really coming from? “His name is Edward,” I said evenly. 

He leaned toward me, almost sneering, his free hand curling into a fist. “It should be ‘freak.’ They’re all freaks—you know that, don’t you?” 

“Oh give it a rest, Mike, they’re perfectly normal.” The lie fell easily from my lips. 

“More like perfectly  _ creepy _ . The way he looks at you...it’s like you’re something to eat. The others too—I’ve been paying attention.” He shook his head. “They think they own this town and everyone in it, but I’m not fooled. How could a doctor have all that money legally? And his adopted kids...rumors say they’ve all got records. On top of that, they’re all dating  _ each other _ . You don’t think that’s weird?” He chuckled dryly, looking away. “Of course,  _ you _ wouldn’t. I guess dating a freak makes you one of them.” 

I was struggling to appear unaffected. He was hinting at things he didn’t understand and insinuating things about me that I didn’t like. Mike was more observant than I had believed he was. This was an obsessive level of attention, paid not just to me but to the Cullens as well. 

Anger coursed through my veins, swift and hot, and I tried to remain calm but it was next to impossible. “What’s your problem, Mike?” 

“My problem?” he laughed without a trace of humor, whipping his head back toward me. His eyes were narrowed. “I worked up the nerve to ask you to the dance last week and you turned me down without even thinking it over—so did two others, in case you forgot—but suddenly a Cullen starts paying you a little bit of attention and you can’t keep your hands off him!” 

His voice had risen in volume by the end of his speech. I could feel the stares of others around us and put up my hands into a defensive position. “Calm down, Mike.”

He took a breath, but his face was still twisted by anger and bitterness. “I don’t like it,” he grumbled, gripping the racket in his hands so tightly, his knuckles were white. 

“This isn’t any of your business.” 

“Like hell it isn't,” he snapped. “I thought we were friends, Bella, but clearly I was mistaken. You’re just as much of an outsider as they all are.” He had started leaning toward me in the middle of his speech, waving his racket around as he gestured. “What would your father say, if he knew? Or do the Cullens have him in their back pocket.”

“Leave my father out of this,” I snapped defensively. 

“You’re right, this is about us.” He stepped into my personal space and towered over me.

It took enormous effort not to step away. Images of the brute from Port Angeles flashed in my mind, making my heart race and my weight shift onto my heels, but I managed to stand my ground shakily. “There is no ‘us’. You have no claim to me.”

His eyes flashed. “But the freak does?”

“Step back, Mike.”

“Answer the question.” 

I ground my teeth. “My relationship with Edward is neither your decision nor your business.” 

His face flushed and his eyes bulged. “Relationship? You’re just interested in his looks and his money,” he accused. “That’ll never last. As soon as he figures you out, he’ll discard you like the trash you are.” 

I heard an eavesdropper gasp nearby. Good. Someone was listening, at least. 

“You are way out of line” I warned him gravely. My hands were nearly on his chest, he was so close. My neck craned back. 

“Oh, should I tell you what people are saying about you around school?” he asked rhetorically. “You should really hear it. Everyone finally sees you for what you really are, Bella.” 

“And what exactly is that, Mike?” I pushed, my stomach churning and my heart pounding. 

“Just another gold-digging, Cullen-chasing whore,” he spat in my face.

A deathly silence met the end of his sentence. My teeth ground together. I was seeing red, itching to slap him, but I held my arms still. 

I’d asked for this. I had to make it count. 

“Mr. Newton!” our gym coach shouted, rushing toward us with her sleeves rolled up and a terrifying look of righteous fury on her face. Someone had alerted her to the confrontation. She was coming to my defense. 

I loved her so much more in this moment than I ever had before. 

Mike went white as a ghost and leapt away from me as if burned. The racket in his hands was bent at an angle, likely never to be straight again. 

I was distantly relieved he’d taken the physical manifestation of his anger out on it and not me. Edward might really have killed him if he had. 

It took mere moments for the coach to drag him out of the gym, his face red as a beet and his angry eyes cast down. I watched him leave, hugging my arms and trying to dispel the sense of disgust that cloaked me. 

In his wake the other students in the class started to surround me with supportive words as well as phrases of shock and disbelief. No one, apparently, had ever expected such ideas to come from Mike. He’d played the golden boy role well. 

I was glad that it had all gone according to plan, but Mike’s words and actions truly did alarm me. Once, I had considered him a friend. Lately, that hadn’t been so much the case, but I doubted that I would ever have seen this truly horrible side of him without Edward tipping me off. 

Mumbling bland reassurances to my classmates, I quickly escaped to the locker room. Whatever they thought of my reaction, I didn’t care. There was too much else to consider. 

I changed back into my regular clothes before the bell rang, but when I left the locker room, Edward was already waiting for me. 

He didn’t explain how he’d gotten out of class early or say a word about what he had heard through others’ minds—he just walked over to me and wrapped me in his arms. 

“Please never do something like that again,” he begged me in a low, fierce whisper, his chin resting securely on the crown of my head.

My eyes threatened tears. I couldn’t think around the hug enough to answer. It was everything at the moment—the entirety of sitting in that darkness with him, holding hands, but so much sweeter. He was tall and solid and cool, like a shady oasis in the middle of a scorching desert. Nothing else mattered, and all the stress of the last hour began steadily slipping away. I felt safe, truly safe, and so content that I never wanted it to end. 

But, it had to—for now. He released me after a moment and ushered me away from the locker room. People were staring at us unabashedly as we walked by, but I had only myself to blame for feeling like a goldfish this time. I ignored them and gazed ahead, focusing on calming my racing heart and sorting through my twisted emotions.

In typical Forks fashion, the sky was grey and it was drizzling outside. Usually, this made me sigh, but today it seemed fitting. I welcomed it. 

Edward waited while I gathered my things, a look of concentration on his face. I was beginning to recognize this particular pensive expression. He was focusing intently on someone’s thoughts. I didn’t dare ask if they were Mike’s. 

As we passed by the main office, I could see Mike through the glass window speaking to the principal and the gym coach. His head was in his hands, his elbows on his knees. He didn’t notice us. I turned my eyes away.

“They’re suspending him,” Edward told me quietly.

_ Good _ , I thought. I didn’t regret making him snap. Maybe someone else would finally get through to him about his behavior. My only qualm was Jessica—she’d just lost her date to the dance. Though I doubted she would blame me, I felt a little guilty all the same. 

I was in such deep speculation that I didn’t realize that anyone was waiting for us until we actually reached Edward’s car. 

This time, I had a name for Edward’s brother when I saw him. 

Emmett was standing beside Rosalie’s red cloth-top with a grin on his face, glancing back and forth between Edward and me. His bulky form still threw me for a bit of a loop, now that I saw him up close. He was as big as a grizzly bear. Even his teeth brought out the likeness. 

As soon as we were between the two vehicles, he groaned and raised his hands toward Edward. “Aw, c’mon—no body to bury? No cops to give the slip to? You’re really losing your edge, little brother.” 

I smiled in spite of myself. Edward’s frown only deepened. 

Emmett’s gaze shifted to me and he grinned. “You’re plucky.” 

“And you’re...Emmett?” I inquired. 

He puffed up, proud I knew his name. “The one and only.” 

“I’m taking Bella home now,” Edward interrupted, staring his brother down as he pointedly opened the door for me. 

I didn’t want to argue—I had a feeling we’d be doing that later—so I wordlessly climbed in, but looked back at Edward’s brother before the door could close. 

“I’ll have a body for you next time,” I reassured him. 

“I’ll hold you to that,” he laughed. 

Edward brought the engine to life and put the car in drive, peeling out of the parking lot without a glance. I was too tired to think of something to say that wouldn’t lead to a whole new discussion. 

After a few turns, however, Edward glanced at me with a slightly worried look on his face and said, a little hesitantly, “Be careful what you promise Emmett. He never forgets.” 

  
  



End file.
